Unearthed
by redsandman99
Summary: There are some things that shouldn't ever be found. They are things that should have died, but never really did. When Jeff stumbles upon one of those things, all hell breaks loose and threatens to unleash hell on earth.
1. Chapter 1

Jeff laid back in the sand and buried his toes into it. This was nice. A nice, relaxing day at the beach was exactly what he needed at the moment. Life out on the road had him stressed, and he needed to take advantage of his time to relax. He had the next three days to do whatever he pleased and he was going to take advantage of it. Although in all honesty, he probably should have been taking advantage of it in the water because it was hotter than hell at the moment, but he couldn't get the motivation to get up. Sighing, he put his arm over his eyes. Maybe the sun would go shine one someone else for a little while so he wouldn't sweat to death.

"Doggy pile!"

Jeff grunted as two bodies landed on top of him. He took his arm away from his eyes and saw that Shane and Shannon were on top of him. He tried to tell them to get the hell off of him, but he had no air in his body to do so. So he just resorted to hitting them both on their backs as hard as he could.

"Get off my boyfriend you ass clowns! You're fucking squashing him!"

Shannon and Shane got off of Jeff just as Chris was coming over to kick their asses. Jeff coughed and gasped for air, holding on to his ribs as he did so. The doggy pile thing hadn't actually hurt that badly, but it still was a somewhat unpleasant surprise. "Guys, what the hell?" he managed to say after a couple of minutes.

Shane at least had the decency to pretend to look sorry. "Sorry man, we were just joking around. We weren't really trying to hurt you."

Chris glared at him while helping Jeff up to his feet. "Well have fun at someone else's expense. Why can't you guys go bug Matt?"

Shannon pointed out to the ocean. "Dude, he and Mor are practically fucking out there. Matt gets scary when we try to interrupt his sexy time."

Despite the pain in his ribs, Jeff giggled. "Sexy time? Really Shan? Did you really just say that?"

"Yes I did," Shannon replied. "What are you going to do about it? Huh?" He playfully shoved Jeff. "Come on Hardy, tell me what ya gonna do about it."

"I'll do this!" Jeff tackled Shannon and started playfully hitting him. They began rolling all around the sand, smacking each other and making a scene.

"Go Shanny!" Shane cheered. "Kick his ass!"

"Bitch please, this punk don't stand a chance against Jeff," Chris said.

Shannon and Jeff stopped play fighting to stare up at Chris in disbelief. "Dude, don't ever say "bitch please" again," Shannon requested. "That sets gay people everywhere back like a hundred years."

Jeff nodded in agreement. "I love ya Chrissy but even I don't want to hear that come out of your mouth."

Chris pouted. "Oh come on. It didn't sound that bad."

"Oh yeah?" Shane challenged. "How much are you willing to bet on that?"

Chris rolled his eyes. "Whatever." He was still pouting, which made Jeff feel kind of bad. "Oh Chrissy," he said as he got up to his feet. He put his arms around the older man's neck and gave him a kiss. "Don't be like that."

"Why not? It gets me lots of kisses from you."

"Oh, so you're using me for my kisses now? I'm so insulted." Jeff tried to pull away but Chris held on tightly.

"Oh you're not going anywhere," the Canadian said with a smirk. "I've got you right where I want you."

"Damn it, why are these people always so damn mushy?" Shannon grumbled. "Seriously, can't they keep it in their pants?"

"We don't keep it in our pants," Shane pointed out. "I'm just sayin."

"Helms, when we make out and stuff, it's hot. When everyone else does it, they need to knock it off cuz we're not involved."

"How about you two just go away?" Jeff growled at his long time friends. He loved the both of them to death, but they were getting on his nerves. "Can't you see that we're trying to make out here?"

"We do see it," Shane said. "That's the problem."

Chris made a move like he was going to slap the hell out of the Hurricane and both Shane and Shannon took off running. "Damn idiots," Chris muttered. "I wish we scared them like Matt did. Maybe then we could get some peace and quiet when we try to make out."

Jeff shook his head. "I wouldn't exactly say that we're quiet. He looked around and saw that there really weren't all that many other people on the beach with them. Feeling frisky, he groped Chris through his swim trunks. "Usually our making out turns into something that is very loud and sweaty."

"That's a good point," Chris said. "But that loud and sweaty stuff is fun." He smirked deviously. "Especially when I can make you scream my name over and over again."

Jeff grinned. "Maybe if you play your cards right, we could do that when we get home."

"Why wait till then? Let's give everyone here a show."

"We could...if you can catch me." Jeff slipped out of Chris's grasp and took off running as fast as he could. He heard Chris curse under his breath before chasing after him and that made him laugh. He was faster than Chris but he did plan to get caught--eventually. He just wanted to make Chris work for the nookie for once.

"Jeffery Nero Hardy, this is not fair!" Chris shouted. "You cannot grope me and run away!"

"Sorry! Can't do that!" Jeff started running even faster. This was actually pretty funny. Poor Chris didn't stand a chance at catching him. "Come on Chris! You should--"

The sand underneath Jeff's feet suddenly gave out and he found himself falling into a hole that he didn't even know that was there. He landed with a painful thump, nearly breaking his own arm by landing on it. Coughing and shaking sand out of his hair, he looked around. It literally looked like he was inside some underground cave. The ground beneath him and the walls around him were all rock and it was much cooler down there than it was up above it. Now how the hell there was a cave here, he did not fucking know. He had been to this beach a hundred times and he had never stumbled upon anything like this before.

"Jeff!" Chris shouted. "Are you okay?"

Jeff looked up. Chris, Matt and Mor were looking down at him. "Yeah," he said shakily. "I think I'm okay."

"Shane and Shannon are going to go find something we can use to help pull you out," Matt said. "Just stay calm."

"I am calm!" Jeff shouted. He rubbed the arm he had landed on as he tried to see if there was anyway he could just jump up and grab someone's hand. Seeing as how he had actually fallen a good ten to fifteen feet, he didn't see that happening. Not unless he suddenly became Kofi Kingston anyway.

So with the jumping idea not happening, he started looking around to see if he could climb up the wall. But as soon as he touched the wall, his hands became all wet with some weird, blue sticky shit. "Yuck!" he said in disgust.

"Dude, don't touch anything down there!" Mor yelled. "There could be poisonous things in there."

"Why would you say that?" Chris asked. "Are you trying to give me a heart attack or something?

Jeff shuddered and kept looking around. The only real light he had was from the sun shining down above him, but strangely, he could no longer feel the heat from it. In fact, terrible chills were going through him, making his teeth chatter violently. The feeling that he was not alone down there began to overtake him, and it was scary as hell.

"Jeff?" Matt said. His voice was filled with concern. "Jeff what's wrong?"

Jeff couldn't answer him. His voice was stuck inside of his throat. He took a few tentative steps towards the darkness. Now he was aware that doing what he was doing was completely stupid and it got dumb bimbos killed all the time in horror movies, but he couldn't help himself. Something was literally pulling him forward, making him go to where he didn't want to. _What the fuck? No, I have to get out of here! What the fuck is happening to me?_

"Sweetie?" Chris called out. "Honey come back here! Shane and Shannon are coming back with the rope."

Once again, Jeff's voice got caught in his throat. He began to breathe quickly with fear as he entered the darkness totally. He couldn't even see his own hands and they were right in front of him. Failing at dragging his own feet, he went deeper and deeper into the cave. Just when he thought he was going to have a full blown panic attack, a blue light illuminated the area around him, taking him completely by surprise. Blinking until his eyes adjusted to the sudden light, he looked and saw that he had stumbled upon a coffin. At least, it looked like it was supposed to be a coffin. It wasn't made out of wood though. It was made out of stone and it had all kinds of weird engravings on it.

Hearing the others yelling for him off at a distance, Jeff found his hand moving against his will to touch the lid of the coffin. As soon as his fingertips began tracing the engravings, the lid literally flew straight up and burst into pieces. Jeff let out a scream and tried to jump back, but only succeeded in falling down. Landing on his back, he groaned loudly. His whole body felt incredibly weak and shaky. Trying to regain control of himself, he started to sit up. But as he did so, he noticed something crawling out of the coffin. _Oh...my...God..._

The thing had brownish/blackish skin, sunken in red eyes, one long slit where its nose was supposed to be and some weird, red, snake skin like plate on its chest. It stared at Jeff hungrily, grabbing his ankle before he could regain his bearings and run away. He let out a scream and tried to kick his way free, but the thing grabbed his other foot and pulled him closer. He nearly stopped breathing as it put its face right next to his. He could feel its hot breath and he nearly threw up. It smelled so much like death that it was sickening.

"So pretty," the creature rasped out. It licked the side of Jeff's face with its green tongue, making Jeff wince. Being licked by this thing was not like being licked by a person or an anmial. When this thing licked him, it literally felt like he had a whole bunch of maggots crawling around on his face.

"Jeff! Jeff!"

Jeff heard Matt and Chris's voices and saw the reaction the creature had when it heard them. It looked absolutely ready to kill them. Suddenly terrified for his boyfriend and brother, he found the strength to shove the creature off of him and somehow managed to scramble up to his feet and take off running. He went back the way he thought he had come and ran straight into Chris and Matt.

"What the hell were you doing?" Matt asked. "We've been yelling at you for--"

"Just come on!" Jeff urged. He started trying to pull them away from where that fucked up creature was. "I want to get out of here!"

Chris looked at Jeff with concern. "Honey what the fuck is wrong? You look like you've seen a ghost."

"Chrissy please, I just want to get out of here." Jeff was almost in tears now. He was so beyond freaked out at the moment and he wanted nothing more than just to get the fuck out of there.

"Okay okay, we'll go," Chris said quickly. He and Matt lead Jeff back to where the others had a rope hanging down, just waiting to pull them back up. Jeff's heart didn't stop pounding in his chest until he was actually back out though, and even then, a slight unpleasant feeling stayed deep inside of him. That thing...what was it? Did he even want to know? Collapsing down on to the sand, he tried to get his breathing back under control. He was out of there and he was safe. That was all that mattered.


	2. Chapter 2

Matt rubbed the back of his neck. It was several hours after the whole incident at the beach and he was still worried about Jeff. His younger brother wasn't acting right. Something had happened down in that cave but nobody could get Jeff to tell them what it was. Matt had Chris bring Jeff over for a movie night in hopes that they could either get information out of him, or maybe just get him out of the distracted state he was in. Unfortunately, Jeff was not taking the bait.

Mor came into the kitchen and found Matt standing there. "You okay baby?" he asked.

Matt shook his head.

"Worried about Jeff?"

"Yup," Matt confirmed. He leaned against his counter and rubbed his temples. "I really wish he wasn't so stubborn. It would be easier for us to help him if he could at least tell us what got him so freaked out."

Mor shook his head. "Honey just give him time. I'm sure you'll annoy him to the point that he'll tell us just to shut you up."

Matt raised his eyebrows. "Are you saying that I'm annoying?"

"No, I'm just saying that you tend to nag at Jeff until he either storms off in a fit or he tells you what's going on. And I can tell that he does want to say something about what happened, but he's just still too freaked to do it." Mor turned Matt around and put his arms around his neck. "He's going to be fine Matt. Hell, by tomorrow he'll probably be his usual annoying self."

"I hope so," Matt said.

"Oh I know so. After all, I am the Shaman of Sexy, the Guru of Greatness--"

"Honey please don't start that."

"The Chuck Norris of Nookie--"

Matt burst out laughing. "John, I hate to break it to you, but Chuck Norris would top if he were gay. You bottom like there is no fucking tomorrow."

Mor pouted his lips. "You had to point that out, didn't you?"

"Sorry baby. It's just a fact that I had to make sure we had established." Matt rolled his eyes and kissed Mor when the younger man continued to pout. Mor tried to resist at first, but Matt was persistant and Mor eventaully melted into the kiss completely. The kiss soon became more heated and passionate, and Matt quickly lifted his lover up on the counter. "How much time do we have?" Matt asked as he tried to unbutton Mor's jeans.

"Not long enough. Put it back in your pants before I spray you with water."

Matt and Mor sighed in disappointment as they looked over to face Shannon. The Prince of Punk was smirking at them. "Can't you give us like ten minutes?" Matt asked.

Shannon shook his head. "No way. If Shane and I can't do it on movie nights, then you two can't either. Now let's get Johnsafina off the counter so we can go back to watch the movies we picked out."

Mor hopped off the counter while glaring at Shannon. "You're an ass," he said unhappily.

"Take it easy Moria. There's no reason for name calling."

Matt glared at Shannon. "Do you always have to call him those girly names?"

"Yes. Look at him Matt! He's girly! It's okay though. Boinking girly twinks is a valid lifestyle choice."

Mor flipped Shannon off while Matt smacked his friend really hard on the back of the head. Shannon yelped in pain and ran back into the living room. Matt and Mor reluctantly rejoined the others. When they got in there, they found Shane putting in _Observe and Report_ while Chris was on the couch with Jeff, saying something to the still distressed man that Matt didn't quite catch.

Jeff ran his hands through his hair and whined. "I'm fine Chris! Why do you keep acting like I'm not?"

Chris cocked one of his eyebrows. "Do you really need to ask that? We've only been dating for two and a half years. Do you really think I can't tell when something's bothering you?"

"And even if he couldn't tell, I sure as hell can," Matt added. He sat down on the other side of Jeff. "Come on bro, just tell us what's bothering you. We'll stop bugging you so much if you do."

Jeff looked down at his feet. "It's stupid. You're gonna tell me that I imagined it."

"You don't know that," Matt insisted.

"Yes I do! I'm not stupid Matt. What I saw down in that cave was not...it was..." Jeff sighed and covered his face with his hands.

Shannon sighed and knelt down in front of Jeff. "How about I slug Matt and Chris if they don't believe you? Will that make you tell us?"

Jeff's lips twitched a little bit. "Shanny..."

"I'll even throw mustard in Matt's face for good measure."

Matt frowned at Shannon. "Now let's not threaten such horrible things buddy. I'm supposed to be your friend."

"Silence, Mr. Over Logical, Over Protective Douchebag!"

Jeff burst into a fit of giggles, which made Matt forget that Shannon just insulted him. "Okay, okay," Jeff said. "But I'm holding you to your promise Shannon."

Shannon nodded. "I wouldn't expect anything less from you Jeffrey."

Comforted by the fact that Shannon would smack anyone who tried to tell him that he was insane, Jeff was finally ready to talk to them. "There was...there was something down there in that cave with me," he admitted quietly. He began describing how he walked into the darkness against his will, finding the coffin, the lid coming off of it and some kind of creature thing crawling out of it and licking him. Matt stared at Jeff in disbelief, genuinely freaked out by what he was describing. Once Jeff was done talking, they all just stared at him for several minutes. Nobody said anything until Mor broke the silence.

"We should take you to the doctor. That thing could have given you a disease."

Matt gave his boyfriend an exasperated look. "John--"

"Okay, I'm shutting up," Mor said quickly.

Chris rubbed Jeff's back. "Oh baby, come here."

Jeff went into Chris arms and buried his face into the blonde's chest. "You guys actually believe me?"

"I do," Chris assured him. "I sensed that something fucked up was down there, and I know you wouldn't freak out like that for nothing."

Shane stretched his back and shoulders out while yawning. "Well I'm officially creeped out. Thank you for that Jeff."

Shannon glared at Shane. "Dude, it _licked_ Jeff's face. Him just telling us about it doesn't even compare to that."

"I'm still creeped out."

Matt was too. He didn't blame Jeff for being freaked out. While the whole thing seemed out of the ordinary, Matt had gone down to that cave thing with Chris and he had felt some kind of presence down there. Something bad had been down there, and while he had been able to brush that off before, Jeff's story didn't seem unrealistic because he knew he had felt the way he had.

"I officially declare that we should never go to that beach again," Mor announced. "Who's with me?"

All hands were raised. "Good," the Shaman of Sexy said. "It's good that we agree."

"It is," Jeff said. It seemed like a great amount of weight had been taken off his shoulders. He took his face away from Chris's chest. "Can we watch the movie now?"

Matt patted him on the head. "Sure thing Jeffro. Although after that story, we're not watching any of the scary ones we rented."

"Good. I really don't think I could take that shit right now."

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Connor had no idea where the fuck he was. One minute he had been in a bar with Cooper, killing everyone in sight, and the next he was standing in a cave, watching some weird thing licking Jeff's face. "What the hell is going on?" he demanded to know, more than a little freaked out at the moment. _

_Neither Jeff nor the thing answered him. They obviously didn't hear him. He went to go pull the thing off of Jeff because Jeff was his friend and the thing on top of him looked weird as fuck. But before he could do it, someone grabbed his shoulder and turned him around. When he saw who it was, his eyes widened as far as they could go. "Mommy?"_

_Annabelle nodded. "Hello Connor."_

_Connor blinked in surprise. "What are you doing here Mommy?"_

_Annabelle looked around nervously before answering. "Bad things are coming Connor. Jeff stumbled upon something that should have never woken up. It's going to come for him and it'll take everyone else around him down too."_

_"But Mommy, what does that have to do with me?"_

_"You're one of the people who can stop the bad things. You, Cooper and James have work to do. But you guys can't do it alone. You'll need help from some very special people."_

_Connor frowned. "Who?" he asked._

_Before Annabelle could answer, a knife went through her stomach and she fell down to the ground. Connor jumped back as he found himself staring into the eyes of someone he had only seen a picture of before._

_"We're gonna get you," Caroline sang. "Hell's coming to get you."_

Connor woke up in cold sweat. How he didn't wake Cooper up was beyond him. Taking deep breaths, he crawled out of bed and walked over to the window. He couldn't hear any other sounds in the house, which meant James and Mark must have called it a night already. Resting his head against the window, Connor tried to get a grip on what the fuck he had just dreamed. That hadn't been a normal dream. That was one of the weird ones he had that usually were followed by bad things happening. Grabbing on to his own hair, he pulled on it until he whimpered in pain. He didn't like the bad dreams. They stayed with him for days, bothering him and making him nervous.

"Connor? What's wrong?" Cooper had woken up and he was staring at Connor.

Connor didn't answer him. He just continued staring out the window, unable to move. Caroline's words kept replaying themselves over and over in his head. _We're gonna get you. Hell's gonna get you_.

If that wasn't a bad omen, he didn't know what was.

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

The creature from the cave slowly made its way out of the prison it had been kept in for the past 150 years. It felt weak and kind of dizzy, but those things would go away as it regained its strength. Until then, it had thoughts of the pretty boy to keep it company. The pretty little human who tasted so sweet...what had been his name? Oh that's right--Jeff. That's what the rude people had been yelling, which had interrupted the fun it had wanted to have with Jeff. The creature didn't like rude humans. Actually, it really didn't like humans in general. Jeff was the only one that had really caught its attention before. Jeff was so pretty...so tasty...so absolutely perfect for what needed to be done.

The creature stared up at the moon and licked its lips. Now that it was free, it was time to pick up where it left off before the unfortuante incident that had nearly killed it. Everyone, whether it be human, vampire or demon would come to fear him yet again. "Caedes," it growled under its breath, getting the feel of saying its own name again. It laughed, remembering how the name used to strike fear into the hearts of everyone and everything back in the day.

Of course, if it had its way, that was what the name would do again very, very soon. And it was going to start with the pretty little Jeff.


	3. Chapter 3

"Why is it always the three of us that end up in the grocery store?" Chris asked Shane and Matt. They were currently in the cereal aisle and Chris was trying to decide whether to give in to Jeff's demands about buying a chocolate cereal. "I mean seriously, don't our boyfriends ever do any of this stuff?"

"Shannon does if I make him," Shane admitted. "But he's at the Gas Chamber right now so I couldn't drag him along."

"I don't like taking John to the store," Matt said. "He's too picky cuz of his diet. I swear, that man is worse than a woman when it comes to the whole diet thing."

"Well if I had abs like that, I'd do anything to keep them too," Chris said with a grin. He relented and put some chocolate Rice Krispies cereal in his cart. He knew the sugar rush Jeff would get from it would be insane, but he aimed to please his baby. "I wish Jeff would help out some, but he whined when I tried to drag him away from his painting."

Matt shook his head. "I don't know why you would want him to come here. He just causes chaos every time he does tag along. I swear, the poor people who work here look like they are about to have a heart attack every time they see him come in the front doors."

Chris laughed. Yeah, okay, that was definitely true. He followed Matt and Shane further up the aisle and grabbed some cherry pop tarts. Then he followed them around the corner so they could go towards the meat section. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw something strange slip behind the deli counter. But when he turned his head completely to look at it, he saw absolutely nothing out of the ordinary. _Okay, that was kind of weird._ He shook his head and started walking again.

"Hamburger hamburger hamburger!" Shane said excitedly. "Get in my belly hamburger!"

"Yes, it will do that because it has ears and it can hear you," Matt said sarcastically. "And it's just so good for you to eat it raw."

"Oh yeah baby," Shane said, getting into the weirdness he and Matt always seem to get into. "I just like rip open packages of hamburger meat and devour it like an animal. That's how we do it here in the Dirty Dirty."

"You know it!" Matt said. "And what we don't eat of the hamburger, we put it on our nipples and let bears lick it off."

Chris stared at them incredulously. "I am never going anywhere with you guys again. You two are embarrassing." He reached into one of the coolers to grab a package of pork chops. But as soon as he touched it, the meat turned green and maggots burst out of the package. "What the fuck?" he yelled as he snatched his hand away.

"Dude that's sick!" Matt exclaimed. "Why would they put that in here?"

"It was just fine a second ago!" Chris informed him. "But when I touched it--"

"Yuck!" Shane shouted. He had reached in to grab some hamburger meat and it had exploded, revealing itself to be green and filled with maggots. "What the fuck is going on?"

Chris looked up and saw Mr. Reynolds, who ran the meat department coming towards them. He was just about to ask what was going on with the meat when he noticed Mr. Reynolds opening his mouth and thousands of bugs spilling out of it. "Okay, that is probably not a good thing," he commented.

"Probably not?" Matt said incredulously. "I think we're way beyond probably here!"

Loud screaming from across the store caught their attention. They turned around and saw one of the teenaged girls who worked in the deli come running while being chased by a cloud of locusts. "Okay, I'm saying we get the fuck out of here!" Shane said.

Chris couldn't really agree more. He didn't know what the fuck was going on and he didn't care to find out. He took off running with Matt and Shane right on his heels. The people around them were completely freaking out and they were also trying to get the hell out of dodge. The whole scene was complete chaos. Chris did take a look back and saw that the locusts had surrounded a few people who hadn't moved fast enough and they were eating the flesh right off of the poor bastards. _What the fuck? Locusts don't--oh fuck it, I'm not thinking about this shit now!_

Matt, Shane and Chris got out of the store and ran all the way to Matt's car. "Why the fuck did you lock it?" Shane asked.

"It's habit!" Matt said defesnively. He was struggling with his keys because his hands were shaking.

"Well hurry up!" Chris urged him. He was looking back at the store nervously. "I want to get the fuck out of here!"

Matt struggled for about another twenty seconds before getting the doors unlocked. The three of them dived into the car and closed the doors so fast that they were lucky they didn't injure a body part that could have gotten in the way.

"What the fuck was that shit?" Shane asked as Matt started the car. He looked freaked out beyond belief.

"I don't know," Chris said. He tried to take deep breaths in order to get his heart beat back under control. "And I don't care. I just want to go home."

Matt pulled out of the parking lot and started driving down the road. "Well I'll have us there in a--oh fuck."

Chris looked out the front windshield and groaned. There was a big wreck up on the road they needed to be on to go home. Cars were backed up for a good mile or two and there was no real way around the mess. _Damn it. I guess we're gonna be here for awhile then._

XXXXXXXXXXXX

"Dad we have a problem."

James groaned. That was never a statement that he liked to hear, especially when he was just getting out of the shower. "Can it wait until I have clothes on?"

Cooper looked down at James's naked form before nodding. "Yeah, I guess so. But you better hurry up."

"Coop, unless Glenn is setting the house on fire in retribution for me burning him up when we were kids, I really don't want to solve any problems today. I fucking have a cold and I feel like shit."

Cooper glared at him. "Something is wrong with Connor."

"And that's something new?" James replied. "Connor is always goofy."

"Dad! I'm being serious. He woke up at like two this morning and he couldn't go back to sleep. He just kept waking up and freaking out and now he's yanking his hair out and banging his head all over the place." Cooper bounced on the balls of his feet anxiously. "He's not doing it for fun this time Dad. Something's actually wrong with him."

James sighed and quickly slipped his clothes on. Mark and Glenn were out running errands, so he had nobody else to ask if this was true. "I'll talk to him, okay? Just calm down."

Cooper nodded. "O--" A loud scream from downstairs made his voice die in his throat. James's eyes widened and he practically bowled over Cooper while running out of the room. Connor was the one screaming. But Connor never screamed the way he was now. Cooper was right. Something was definitely wrong.

James found Connor in the living room. The young man was on the floor, having one of the worst seizures that James had ever seen. "What the fuck?" James yelled as he slid down to his knees and grabbed on to his son. "Connor!"

Cooper came running in. "Oh my God," he muttered.

"What the fuck do we do?" James asked. Connor was still jerking around in his arms, and James could just imagine his boy swallowing his own tongue. "How the fuck do we stop him from doing this?"

"I...I don't know," Cooper said helplessly.

Well fuck, that wasn't helpful. James tried to remain calm and think about what someone was to do with someone who was having a seizure. But every time he thought he had the slightest good idea, Connor's seizure got more violent and James panicked all over again. _Oh fuck, what the fuck do I do with him?_ "Hospital," he finally said. "Cooper grab the keys to the car. We have to take him up to the hospital."

"What the fuck can they do for him there?" Cooper asked.

"I don't fucking know! Just do as I say damn it!"

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Connor's brain felt like it was going to many things were flashing before his eyes. Locusts eating flesh from the bone. Chaos in a grocery store. Matt, Chris and Shane in that chaos. People trapped inside burning cars. Jeff being pursued by some strange creature that wanted only bad things. It was too much for Connor to handle. He couldn't get a grip on what was happening. "Mom!" he yelled, stumbling through the darkness for a woman he knew that stayed with him beyond the grave. "Make it stop!"_

_"I can't," Annabelle told him. "Nobody can stop this. It's happening now. You need to see this."_

_He shook his head. He didn't want to see it. Too much was going on. It felt like it was going to kill him. "I'm not asleep," he muttered. "I shouldn't see these things. The bad dreams come in my sleep, not when I'm awake."_

_"Connor--"_

_"Lady chill for a second. Can't you see that he's scared?"_

_Connor looked up and saw that a girl was walking towards him and Annabelle. She looked to be only about fifteen or so, and she had the palest skin that he had ever seen. She could have easily passed for an albino except for her black hair. That was about as dark as it could get. Her overly large green eyes were focused on Connor, and they were filled with pity._

_"I was wondering when you were going to get here," Annabelle said. She looked around nervously. "Things are already starting to unravel. Caedes--"_

_"Is behind it, I know," the girl interrupted. "I'm very well aware of what is going on. I'm having a bit of a vision overload myself these days."_

_Connor looked back and forth between them in confusion. "Who are you?" he finally asked the new girl._

_She grinned. "I'm Christina Chase," she told him. She carefully touched his head. "Poor thing. What you're seeing is hurting you, isn't it?"_

_He nodded. "My brain is gonna explode," he told her._

_She shook her head. "It won't. Your brain is not like other people's. It's wired differently." She looked at Annabelle. "But it hurts like a mother fucker to see things like this when you're awake and not used to it. You should be a little more understanding here dead lady."_

_Annabelle put her hands on her hips. "There's not time--"_

_"I know damn it!" Christina nearly yelled. She put her hands up against the side of her head. "I can't do this. I can't...oh fuck, here comes another one."_

_Connor whined and covered his eyes. But even when he did that, he could still see Jeff all alone in his house. A terrible sense of foreboding overtook him. Jeff was in trouble. Something was going to hurt Jeff._

_And there wasn't a damn thing that Connor could do but watch._

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Jeff flipped through the channels, bored out of his damn mind. Chris still wasn't back from the store yet. That fact was bothering Jeff greatly. Jeff wanted to call him, but he couldn't find his cell phone and something was wrong with the land line. Every time he tried to call anyone, it just made the most god awful screeching noises. _I'll go to Matt's place and call him if he's not back in a half hour,_ he told himself. _This is getting ridiculous._

Not finding anything on television, he shut it off and went into the kitchen. He opened the fridge and took the carton of milk out. Setting that on the counter, he started heading towards the pantry so he could get a box of Lucky Charms out. But on his way, he looked out the window and saw a giant black dog standing there. It was just staring at him, and he could have sworn that he heard it growling even with the window closed. Shaking his head, he continued his quest to the pantry. But as soon as he went to open that door, he heard Lizzie whining loudly. "I'll let you out in a minute!" he called out to the impatient Daschund.

Lizzie whined some more and just two seconds later, she came running into the kitchen so she could hide under the table. "What is it girl?" he asked, bending down so he could get a good look at her. She was shaking like there was no tomorrow. "What's got you so scared?"

_There was a fatal car crash up on..._

Jeff's head snapped up. The TV was on. The TV shouldn't have been on. He shut the damn thing off for God's sakes. He went back into the living room to see that the television had turned on by itself. A little freaked out, he grabbed the remote and pressed the off button. It didn't shut off though. It stayed on, still babbling about a car crash. Feeling more freaked out, Jeff pressed the off button on the television itself. It still refused to turn off. Now really freaked, Jeff ripped the cord out of the outlet.

The damn thing still stayed on.

"Neat trick, isn't it?"

Jeff jumped as he turned around. The creature from the cave was standing right in his living room, looking at him with great amusement. "W-w-what?" he finally stammered out.

The thing grinned. "It's just a parlor trick Jeff. If you're that scared by that, then you are really going to be scared here in a little bit."

He stared at it, hardly believing what he was seeing. "What are you?" he asked. "What are you doing in my house? How did you even get in?"

"I am Caedes," the thing replied. "And that's all you really need to know at the moment." Caedes took a step forward and Jeff moved backwards. "There's nowhere for you to run Jeff."

"How do you know my name?" Jeff's voice was shaking badly. Where the fuck was Chris? And seriously, how the fuck did this thing get in?

Caedes grinned. "I heard those other humans say it down in the cave. Just because I'm a demon doesn't mean I'm deaf."

_Demon? Since when the fuck were demons real?_ "Don't touch me!" Jeff gasped as Caedes reached out to him with one of its fingers.

Caedes almost seemed to be pouting. "Oh come on Jeff, I already got a small taste of you down in that cave. I've been dying for another one ever since."

Jeff shuddered. He remembered how it felt to have this thing lick his face and he did not want to experience it again. He had to either get this thing out of the house or he needed to get out and get help himself.

Almost as if it sensed what he was thinking, Caedes grabbed him by the throat and lifted him up into the air. His eyes just about bugged out of his head. Caedes was strong. Like really strong. It could probably snap his neck with one simple twist and he wouldn't be able to stop it. "Are you thinking about doing something mean Jeff?" Caedes asked. "I really hope not. That's only going to make me angry."

Jeff whimpered and raked Caedes's eyes. The demon dropped him and he bolted for the door. But Caedes's strong hands grabbed him again and tossed him so hard that he went all the way across his living room, through the hallway, smashed through the door to his bedroom and landed on the floor. Stunned by that, he had barely moved before Caedes had joined him in his room. "That was a bad move Jeff," Caedes told him. "A very bad thing." It grabbed him by the throat again and put him on the bed. "But that's okay. I guess that means I just get to tame you now."

Jeff gagged as Caedes forced their lips together. He punched and kicked wildly, but none of it made any difference. That disgusting tongue forced its way into his mouth, and he choked as it was shoved down his throat. He tried to keep hitting at Caedes, but suddenly his bedsheets turned against him, tying him spread eagle style, making him completely helpless.

"More parlor tricks," Caedes said with a chuckle. "Impressed?"

"Let me go!" Jeff yelled. He pulled against his restraints desperately. "What the fuck do you want with me?"

Caedes let its long fingernails play with Jeff's clothes teasingly. "What everyone should want from you Jeffey."

Jeff was about to ask what the fuck was that supposed to mean when his eyes happened to look down. His heart just about stopped beating right then and there. The fucking demon was aroused. And it was also HUGE. Jeff was strongly reminded of the novelty dildos at the sex toy stores that weren't actually meant to be shoved in anywhere. "No," he whimpered, trying even harder to get free. "No no no no...."

Caedes just grinned before ripping Jeff's clothes off with one good yank. Jeff shivered at the suddeness of his nudity, but he didn't get a chance to do anything else. He felt the head of Caedes's dick pressing up against his entrance, and before he even got a chance to try to beg for the demon to be stopped, every inch of the enormous cock was inside of him.

The scream that left him would have made someone think that he was getting killed. And it certainly felt like that was the case. It literally felt like his asshole had just been broken. Not just stretched or ripped; the pain went beyond that. He screamed as he felt the demon thrusting into him. Oh fuck, the pain...his mind tried to make him pass out but no matter how hard it tried, it couldn't do it. It, along with his body, had gone into complete shock. His eyes couldn't even produce tears, even though he knew he was crying.

That damn tongue crept up his cheek, making him shake more. He could feel Caedes's breath on his neck, and it made him want to throw up even more. His throat was completely raw already because he had screamed so hard, and all he could do was just lay there make hoarse whimpers and make an attempt at screaming as he was brutalized.

Jeff didn't know how long the assault took place. What he did know was that it seemed to last for hours on end. The pain was completely unbearable. He tried to focus on something else, but it was completely impossible to do that. Finally, after felt like forever, Caedes got off of him and licked his face. The pain was still there. It refused to go away. But as Jeff whimpered, unable to move or speak, the blackness that eluded him for way too long came in full force and he finally and mercifully, passed out.


	4. Chapter 4

Mark watched James pace back and forth across the waiting room. "What exactly did the doctors tell you?" he asked. They still hadn't been allowed to go see Connor yet, but the doctor had given James some sort of status update. Unfortunately, judging from the way James was acting, it wasn't a good one.

"Dr. Phillips said they have to do a whole bunch of brain scanning shit on him," James said. "And he kept grilling me about Connor taking drugs. They're freaking out because the sedatives aren't working like they should." He looked over at Cooper. "Are you sure he didn't take anything? I mean, could he have bought something and took it without us knowing it?"

Cooper shook his head. "No way. He actually got pissed at me when I used to do drugs, so--"

"You did drugs?" Glenn asked.

"I experimented," Cooper clarified. "Cocaine, pot--nothing major like meth or heroin. But Connor got pissy at me so I stopped that after awhile." He sighed. "Unless he was drugged by someone else, I don't see Connor touching any of that shit."

Mark ran his hand through his hair. Well now they were back to not knowing what the fuck could possibly be wrong with Connor. "Damn it to hell," he muttered. He didn't know what the fuck to do. James was freaking out big time and there was no point in saying that things were going to be okay because that definitely didn't seem to be the case at the moment. "James, would you please just sit down? The longer you keep pacing like that, the more likely it is that your going to toss something at someone." _Or stab them a million times and horribly kill them._

James shook his head. "I'm not sitting down," he growled. "Just leave me alone."

"James--" Mark stopped talking as soon as he saw the look James was giving him. He sighed and looked away. James wasn't going to be calmed down, and it would be foolish to keep trying to do that. Honestly though, Mark understood why James was freaking as badly as he was. Connor was the baby of the family. Sure James would freak out too if this was Cooper instead, but still, Connor was Connor. Not knowing what the fuck was wrong with him and not being able to do anything but sit and wait was the worst part. Leaning back in his chair, Mark started to watch the clock. Sure he knew that would just make time go slower, but he already was tired of looking at everything else in the damn room. _Come on, come on, come on be okay Connor. Please just fucking be okay. That's all I'm asking from you right now._

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Connor felt completely drained. Physically, emotionally, mentally--he honestly didn't think he had any kind of strength left in his body. He rested his head on Christina's lap, still not sure who the fuck this girl was or why he kept feeling like he should trust her at all. "Jeff," he moaned, feeling so fucking angry that he couldn't stand it. He had seen the demon attack Jeff and hadn't been able to do anything about it._

_Christina sighed. "I know. This is bad."_

_"Why did I have to see that?" Connor whined. Now that the images were in his head, he was having a terrible time trying to get them out. "What's wrong with me?"_

_"I think you already know the answer to that," Christina answered. "It's not hard to figure out."_

_He pouted as he tried to think about it. His brain was exhausted and it took him a little longer than it should have. "Am I psychic?" he asked softly._

_Christina nodded. "Yeah. You're just like me."_

_"Is that why you're here with me? Are you here to help me?"_

_She shrugged. "That could be part of it. Or it might be because you guys won't be able to stop Caedes by yourselves."_

_"Who?"_

_"The demon we saw attack Jeff."_

_"Oh. I didn't know it had a name."_

_"Well he does."_

_"How did you know it?"_

_"I've seen a picture of him before."_

_"Where at?"_

_"In a couple of different old ass books and some websites. Google his name and you'll find a whole bunch of shit."_

_"What about you? Are you real or am I making you up? Cuz I've done that before."_

_Christina grinned a little bit. "I'm real. I may not officially exist, but I'm real."_

_Now that just confused Connor more. "Wait, what does that mean? Are you dead then?"_

_"Nope." She moved his head away from his lap and stood up. "I'm alive. I just uh...well it's a little too complicated to explain right now. We don't have that kind of time."_

_"But--"_ Connor's mind snapped back into reality so fast that it for a minute, he thought he was seeing stuff again. When he regained his bearings and realized he was in the real world, he was not pleased to see that he was strapped down to a hospital bed. "What the fuck did you people do to me?" he growled.

James, Mark, Glenn and Cooper, who were just coming in with a doctor, all stared at him in disbelief. "Connor?" James said slowly.

"No, I'm Santa," Connor replied. He pulled against the restraints, but he couldn't get free from them. His body felt all weird and weak. "Seriously, what the hell is wrong with me?"

"You were having a fit," Cooper explained. "And we couldn't snap you out of it and they had to sedate you to see if there was something wrong with your brain--"

"Apparently you shouldn't even be awake right now," Glenn chimed in. "You should be in a coma." He looked at the doctor. "I think you should probably leave the room before James gets over his relief and--"

James decked the doctor right in the face, knocking him out cold. "Too late," James growled. "I did it anyway."

Connor should have found that funny. He always thought it was funny when his dad hit people. But there was still a big problem that he had to worry about. "Jeff," he said, still trying to get free from his restraints. "Jeff's hurt."

Mark frowned as he came over and set Connor free. "What are you talking about? We haven't heard--"

"You wouldn't have," Connor said impatiently. He took Mark's phone out of his pocket and quickly dialed Chris's number. "Answer," he muttered under his breath, ignoring the looks and the questions he was getting from the others. "Come on, answer the fucking phone."

"Hello?" Chris finally said.

"Have you been home yet?" Connor asked immediately. He didn't think that Chris had found Jeff yet. He couldn't have. Chris would have sounded a fuck of a lot more upset if he had.

"Connor?"

"Jeff's hurt." Connor had to blurt that out. Chris was just going to waste time like an idiot if he didn't.

"What? What are you talking about?"

"Get home. You'll find him in your bedroom. I'll be there soon." Connor hung up the phone and handed it back to Mark. He then got out of bed and immediately wished he hadn't. Not only did his headache make him feel like he was going to die, but whatever he had been drugged with made him feel faint and sick to his stomach. He tried to take a step forward but he immediately began to fall down.

James immediately caught Connor and held on to him tightly. "You're not making any sense Connor," James said gently. "None of us have any idea what the hell you are talking about right now."

Connor closed his eyes and let out a high pitched whining noise. This was frustrating. How was he supposed to explain this when he didn't even understand it himself? And would they even really believe him even if they told them. "Jeff's in trouble," he finally said, getting to the fucking part that actually mattered to him at the moment. "Jeff's hurt. We go now."

James looked apprehensive. "Connor--"

"We go now," Connor insisted, working himself up into a tantrum. He was going to get what he wanted one way or another. "Now now now now now now NOW!"

"Okay, okay!" Cooper said quickly. "We'll go now. Right Dad?"

James looked back and forth between Connor and Cooper before nodding. "Okay, we'll go to Jeff. But Connor, I swear, if you EVER do that seizure shit again, I will throttle the shit out of you."

Connor nodded. James wasn't actually being serious...well maybe he was, but Connor didn't have time to worry about that. He still had about a million questions that needed to be answered and nobody to answer them for him. _Christina. I gotta find her again. She could tell me what the fuck is going on here. She seemed smart...and pale...maybe she is dead. Or maybe she's a vampire. Hmmmm...vampires....hopefully not like the Twilight vampires because those were lame. She should be a cool vampire that actually kills people and sucks their blood. I think I should do that. I should start biting people and sucking their--wait, what the fuck am I doing? Jeff's in trouble. Damn it, why the hell weren't Chris and Matt around to stop him from getting hurt? What the hell were they up to?_

XXXXXXXXXXX

"Are you sure Connor was serious about Jeff being hurt?" Matt asked as they pulled up to Jeff's house. The car wreck they had run into had been a nightmare and the detour they had been forced to take had taken forever. "Did Jeff call him or something?"

"I don't know," Chris said as he got out of the car. "He didn't say. I swear though, if he was just saying that to fuck with me, I'm going to kill him."

"Are you sure threatening a serial killer's son is a good idea?" Shane asked.

Chris didn't answer him. He just ran up to the front door and got it unlocked with his shaky hands. He knew that Connor didn't actually live in the same reality as they all did all the time, but the way the younger man had sounded made him truly believe that something could be wrong with Jeff. Add the fact that Jeff wasn't answering his cell phone and he couldn't even get through to the home phone made him all the more nervous.

"Here, I've got it," Matt said. He took the key from Chris and got the door unlocked.

Chris didn't even thank Matt. He just ran into the house and looked around. "Jeff?" he called out. There was no answer. "Jeff?" Still no answer. Gulping, he went into the bedroom. What he found inside of there was like every nightmare he had come true. Jeff was laying on the bed, completely naked and covered in blood. His legs were spread slightly apart and anyone who even took a glance at what was in between them could tell that he had been raped.

Someone started yelling about calling an ambulance, but Chris honestly couldn't tell if it was Matt or Shane. His ears weren't working right anymore. Stumbling over on his own feet, he got on the bed and cradled Jeff's head in his arms. Jeff was still breathing, but he wasn't waking up. Chris wanted him to wake up, but it was probably a good thing that he didn't. The pain he was going to be in when he finally did wake up...Chris closed his eyes and rested his forehead against Jeff's. Horrible feelings of guilt that were going through him were too much to take. How could...why...no, he couldn't finish those thoughts. They were going to drive him crazier than he was already going.

Still, there was one thought that wouldn't go away. And it wasn't so much as a thought as it was a vow.

Somebody was going to fucking die for this. He was going to make damn sure of that.


	5. Chapter 5

Matt was in a state of shock. Somebody (or somebodies--nobody could say for sure) had hurt his little brother. No, wait, hurt wasn't strong enough of a word. Whoever it was had fucking _brutalized_ his Jeff. Jeff had been horribly raped; the attack had not only torn Jeff's passage up, but it had done damage to his insides. The doctors had done everything they could to fix him up, but there was no telling what kind of psychological trauma he had suffered as a consequence.

_This can't be happening,_ Matt told himself. He was in Jeff's hospital room with his dad, Shannon, Mor and Chris. Jeff was still out, although it wasn't much of a mercy because every so often he would whimper and cry out, making their hearts break all over again. _This has to be a nightmare. I'm going to wake up right now and Jeff will be just fine and none of this would have happened._

"Why couldn't Jeff just have been attacked by the meat?" Shannon asked, breaking the terrible and uncomfortable silence that had overtaken the room.

Mor glared at Shannon. "Is that really the thing to ask right now?"

"Well at least meat wouldn't have been able to rape him!" Shannon said defensively. "And if Jimmy Legs, Hurricane and Mongoose could outrun the meat, Jeff sure as hell could have done it. And he would be fine right now! Don't you want him to be fine?"

"Of course I do! But you saying stupid stuff like that isn't going to make him better, now is it?"

"Did I say it would, you little--"

"Boys you knock that off this minute," Gil ordered. The Legend looked ready to slap the bickering duo. "I am not putting up with this bullshit today."

Shannon and Mor both looked down at their feet. "Sorry," the both mumbled. When the Legend told you to knock something off, you knocked it off, plain and simple.

Matt sighed and leaned back against the wall. He still could not wrap his head around this whole situation. Who could possibly want to do this to Jeff? Jeff hadn't done anything to deserve this. He wouldn't hurt anyone and he didn't have any enemies that Matt could think of. _Was it someone we know? Was it a stranger? Was it a crazy fan or a crazy wrestler hater? Was it a planned attack or was it done at random?_ Matt kept asking himself these things over and over again, even though he knew that he didn't have any of the answers. This was driving him absolutely crazy, and he was literally ready to kill whoever had done this to Jeff.

"I should have made him go with us," Chris said, speaking for the first time in a really long time. He was holding on to Jeff's hand tightly, gently stroking his boyfriend's hair. "If I--"

"Don't start that," Shane said to Chris. "Seriously, it's not your fault."

"But how could Connor know before me? I always know when something's wrong with Jeff."

Matt sighed. "We don't know, okay? But you have got to stop beating yourself up like this. Jeff is going to need us to be strong for him, and he's going to need you more than ever. Okay?"

Chris nodded. It was obvious that he was still beating himself up, but they all knew that he would do anything for Jeff.

Jeff whimpered suddenly, making them all jump. "No please, please don't," he said softly, sounding like he was about to cry. "Leave me alone."

Matt felt his heart break into a million pieces. Jeff sounded so helpless...._Note to self: go to James and Mark for torture tips. I want whoever hurt my brother to suffer more than they've ever suffered in their life._

XXXXXXXXXXXXXXX

_Jeff was standing in the middle of a destroyed street, staring at the mess of broken, dead bodies at his feet. The puddles of blood on the ground were literally up to his ankles, and the stench of death was so heavy in the air that it was choking him. He wanted to get away so badly, but he couldn't. Caedes was keeping him there, making him look at the bodies that were piling up._

_"This is the future Jeffrey," Caedes said, licking his lips and sounding very excited about the prospect of it. "My awakening has broken the barriers between the living and the dead. Not only will my army rise again, but the Underworld will too. The demons will sweep the world and then every single human will be wiped off the face of the earth." Caedes grinned. "Except for you of course. I'll make sure to spare you."_

_Jeff shuddered and shrank back as the demon touched his face. He couldn't tell if he was dreaming or not. It felt like he was stuck somewhere in between his conscious and unconscious state. "Why me?" he asked, wishing he was just dead already. The pain from the earlier attack was coming back in full force and he couldn't take it. It hurt so bad that death felt like the better alternative. "Why did you choose me?"_

_Caedes shrugged. "Why wouldn't I choose you? I mean, LOOK at you." The demon grinned and licked the side of Jeff's face. Jeff felt his stomach lurch violently and he didn't know how the fuck he didn't throw up._

_"Okay, now that is just gross. Seriously? What is it with you demons and human love slaves? I mean, okay, so I'm not the picture of humanity here, but damn it to hell dude! Get the hell away from that poor guy!"_

_Caedes and Jeff turned around to see a girl standing behind them. She was a good six feet tall and she didn't look at all disturbed by the fact that she was standing in a street filled with dead bodies._

_Caedes sighed and rolled his eyes. "Of course, every great plan has to have complications..." he muttered._

_The girl raised her eyebrows. "I'm a complication? No no no, the Lawsons are going to be the complication. I'm the fucking shit that will rain down on your parade." She stopped and wrinkled her nose. "Okay, and I'm now wishing that I had used a different comparison because I've managed to gross myself out."_

_Jeff gulped. "Who are you?" he asked, getting more and more confused by the minute. He had never seen this girl in his life and he had absolutely no reason to dream her up now._

_"She doesn't matter," Caedes said quickly. "She'll be among the dead soon enough."_

_"You know what? If I had a penny every time some fucking demon said that, I would be a fucking billionaire by now," the girl muttered. She shook her head. "Well since Christina's overactive brain has fucked my sleep cycle, I might as well give this nap shit up." She looked at Jeff. "I think it's time you woke up to."_

Jeff's eyes snapped open suddenly, and the dream world that Caedes had him in disappeared. He could feel Caedes's anger, and it threw him off for quite a few minutes. When he did regain his bearings, he found himself staring right into Chris's eyes.

"Baby?" Chris said, his voice cracking with worry.

Jeff winced and gritted his teeth. The pain in his body was absolutely terrible. "It hurts," he whimpered. "Chris help me."

Chris frowned and examined the I.V. that was in Jeff's arm. "Shane go tell the doctor this thing isn't working," he ordered. "This morphine drip is obviously defective."

Shane quickly left, and Jeff could sense the others were about to start talking and asking him questions. He closed his eyes and tried to fight back the tears of pain and shame. Chris sighed and hugged him tightly. He kept trying to fight the tears for a couple of more minutes, but eventually broke down and began sobbing harder than he had ever sobbed in his life.

XXXXXXXXXXXX

Several thousand miles away, Christina Chase was trying to put all the pieces of the chaos together. The visions she had been bombarded with were keeping her in the loop, which was a good thing. The bad thing though was that her brain was starting to feel like mush. "Okay, so when Caedes woke up, it triggered that earthquake in China, the flood on the South America coast, the apocalypse spike here in good old AC, the crazy meat and locusts thing down in North Carolina and the breakdown between the world of the living and the world of the dead."

"Technically I don't think the breakdown has gotten that far yet," her older brother Andy pointed out. Besides from their sister Jackie, he was the only one in the room with her. "We'd be in a shit load more trouble if it had."

"Yeah, but something went wrong because Grandma Shirley fucking sent him to hell 150 years ago," Jackie spoke up. She had just woken up from a nap and she kept looking out the window like she was expecting company. "And when Grandma Shirley didn't fuck around when she sent people to hell."

Christina sighed. 150 years ago, their grandma had teamed up with their aunt Ceilia, their aunt Doris, plus some dudes with the last name Lawson to kill Caedes in the first place. Either the job hadn't gotten done well enough or something else was currently going on and Caedes had been able to slip through the cracks. "And now Caedes has targeted Jeff Hardy--"

"To be his love monkey," Jackie said with a shake of her head. "I just saw that thing _lick_ him. It's tongue--"

"Jackie, Connor and I saw Caedes rape Jeff," Christina interrupted. "Nothing you're about to say is going to top that horror."

Jackie folded her arms over her chest. "There were also a whole bunch of dead bodies and I think I pissed Caedes off by making sure Jeff woke up before the ugly mother fucker could have some Freddy Krueger like fun."

Andy rolled his eyes. "Okay, so when another army of demons comes trying to kill us all, we know to blame you." He looked at Christina. "Now I'm on board with the stopping the big bad demon plan, don't get me wrong. But seriously, who in the blue hell is this Connor guy you supposedly met up with in your brain? Because that part is confusing the fuck out of me."

Christina sighed impatiently. "Andy, I told you that I'm not quite sure. I was having a vision and then it got hijacked by some dead chick named Annabelle who told me to help her son Connor. I don't--"

"What if he's one of those Lawsons?" Jackie asked suddenly.

Christina and Andy stared at her. "What?"

"Well I was just thinking that Grandma Shirley always talked about Jordan Lawson because she boned him--"

"You don't know that!" Andy said in disgust. "I've seen pictures of him and Grandma--"

"Was more interested in his big dick than his face," Jackie replied.

Christina made a face. The last thing she wanted to picture was her long dead grandma having sex. "Jackie, please get to the point," she begged.

"I was until I was rudely interrupted," Jackie said, glaring at Andy. "Anyways, she said that good old Jordan had some descendents left, and maybe we're supposed to team up with them to stop uh...what's this guy's name again?"

"Caedes," Christina said. She had a feeling that Jackie was right. Connor could be one of the people they needed to find in order to have a beter shot at killing Caedes once and for all.

"Well this has been a great talk," Andy said, looking out the window with worried eyes. "I'd say we get this guy right now but uh...I think we need to tell Rupes and the others to arm back up because we've got more demons."

Christina groaned and covered her face with her hands. "Damn it damn it damn it...."

"Oh quit whining," Jackie said. "That's not going to fix anything." She opened the window. "Last one out to fight is the rotten egg!"

Andy and Christina watched Jackie jump out the window before exchanging looks. "I've said this before and I'm going to say it again right now: she's got issues," Andy said.

Christina nodded."Yeah...that's not the big issue though."

"I know, but it's worth repeating every so often."

Christina shook her head. If the Lawsons were as crazy as their grandma said they were, then Jackie's crazyness would go really well with theirs. _If we get to them that is....from the way this day is going we're going to be lucky not to get killed within the next couple of hours._


	6. Chapter 6

Caedes was not happy. His plan had been spoiled. He had been hoping that by infiltrating Jeff's dream, he would have been able to actually use the connection he had established between them to take Jeff out of that hospital and reunite them without even having to leave his lair or sending any of the demons in his rapidly returning army. But the girl...Jackie, that was her name...had prevented him from doing that. Before he had clawed himself back out of hell, he had learned the names of the descendents of the bastards who had gotten in his way the first time around. The one that had stuck out most to him was Jackie. She was the one he needed to keep away from Jeff. If she got to him before he did, then he was going to have one hell of a time getting to him then.

"Well that's not going to happen," he said under his breath. He had to find a way to stop her from getting to Jeff. Jeff was his now, for the rest of eternity. It didn't matter that Jeff was a human. In fact, that was why he liked the boy. Humans were so breakable and fragile; it was a wonder that they had been able to take over this dimension the way they had. They died so easily and they usually had just about everything to lose. _Oh well, it doesn't really matter now. They're all going to die and then the only one left will be Jeff._ He had no intention on killing Jeff any time soon. Oh no, Jeff was way too much fun to play with. Jeff had so many family members and friends that he needed to watch die and such a tight little body...Caedes looked down and saw that he was actually getting hard just thinking about Jeff. _There's only one way to properly take care of this._

He walked deeper into his lair, not stopping until he was face to face with his army. They had been sent to hell with him after his plan had gone wrong the first time, but now they were back and better than ever. "You," he said, pointing to the Molder demons right in the front. There were about five of them (where he was pointing at anyway...he knew there were more of them somewhere though), and their bodies were pretty much made out of stone that looked like molten lava. They had ram horns on their heads and eyes so black that they didn't even look like they were there; it actually looked like they all just had empty eye sockets instead of eyes. "Go to Apocalypse City and find the girl I told you about earlier. You'll know her when you see her. Kill her, her siblings and anyone else she's got with her. Hell, take that entire fucking city down if you can. Burn it to the ground for the final time."

The Molder demons grunted, indicating that they understood. They were incapable of actually speaking, but luckily that wasn't actually a requirement when working for him. And in all honesty, he liked the non-talking members of his army better. They were usally the ones that listened better.

Caedes looked to see several Nightcrawlers walking around on the ceiling. They were some of the more interesting demons that he had ever encountered and that was saying something. They could crawl around on walls and ceilings and they could jump such long distances that it actually looked like they were flying half the time. "The Lawsons should still be on their way to see Jeff right now. Make sure they don't get there."

"Yesss Massster," they said at once, their obscenely long tongues coming out of their mouths as they did so.

Caedes looked down from the ceiling and caught the eye of his personal pets. They looked like oversized black panthers, but they were actually demons that he had created to obey his every whim. "You know what I want to do," he said, petting them on the head. "Don't you?"

They all purred, although to anyone else, it would have sounded like a growl.

"Good kitties," he said. "Now come on. Let's go get my Jeff."

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

Jeff looked up at the ceiling. The doctors had pumped his body full of morphine but it wasn't helping. For some reason, he could still feel the pain of the Caedes's attack. And that caused him to play the attack over and over again in his head, which was driving him absolutely insane. He couldn't understand why the monster had attacked him. What had he done to deserve it? Had he been bad in some way? He knew he had made more than his share of mistakes, but it wasn't like he had ever tried to be bad.

"Jeffro?" Chris said quietly. He was still holding Jeff in his arms, absolutely refusing to let go. "I know you don't want to talk about this, but can you talk to me please? I need to know who hurt you."

Jeff's lower lip began to tremble. Chris was right; he _didn't_ want to talk about it.

Matt stroked Jeff's hair gently. "Jeff please, tell us who hurt you. We need to make sure that they can never do it again."

"Yeah," Shannon agreed. Mor, Shane and Gil all nodded along.

Jeff looked down at his hands. He wasn't sure if it was possible for them to stop Caedes. Caedes had been so strong...the strength he had was nearly impossible to comprehend, even for Jeff and he had been the one that had been on the wrong end of it. How in the world would they stop him? "It was...it was the thing from the beach," he admitted, each word almost making him burst into tears all over again.

"Are you serious?" Chris asked after a moment of stunned silence.

"Does it look like I'm joking right now?" Jeff nearly screeched. He didn't mean to do it. He really didn't. But it was like he couldn't help himself.

"I'm confused," Gil said. "What is the thing from the beach? I've obviously missed something.

Matt quickly explained what had happened at the beach with Jeff and the falling in the cave thing. Jeff closed his eyes and rested his head against Chris's chest, the tears escaping him once again. "I sorry," he whimpered between sobs. "I didn't mean to yell Chris, I didn't."

"Sssshhhh," Chris said in the most soothing voice he could manage. He held on to Jeff tightly. "It's okay. Don't worry about it."

"I was bad, wasn't I?" Jeff asked miserably. "That's why Caedes hurt me."

"Caedes?" Mor said in confusion. "The thing from the beach has a name?"

"You were not bad," Chris said vehemently, ignoring Mor's question. "You understand me? You did nothing to deserve this."

Jeff tried to regain control of himself, but he couldn't. Despite Chris's words, the feeling that he had somehow brought it on himself wouldn't go away. But that was nothing compared to the other feeling that was starting to consume him. "What if he tries to get me again?" he asked, stumbling over each word as he tried to get it out. "Oh God Chris, it hurt so bad! It still hurts and I can't go through that again! I can't! I can't please--"

"I won't let him," Chris promised, tears starting to form behind his own eyes. "You understand me? I will do anything to protect you. I won't let that thing touch you again."

Jeff just broke down completely again, too scared to really be comforted. The pain, the fear, the knowledge that Caedes was still out there somewhere...it was too much for him to take. He was in a state of complete and total panic and he didn't know how to pull himself out of it. _Oh God please don't let Caedes come after me, please don't let him come after me. I'll die if he hurts me again and I don't want to die. Oh God oh god oh god...._

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

To Jackie, this was getting absolutely ridiculous. There were demons and vampires fucking everywhere and more just kept appearing every time their brethren died. "Rupes!" she shouted, looking over at her and her siblings long time guardian. "I am starting to get really pissed off here!"

"I am too!" he replied, staking a vampire right in its heart. "I think it's time you did something to put a stop to this bullshit!"

"Me?" she whined. "Why does it always have to be me?"

"Do I really need to answer that right now?"

She sighed. It was so unfair. People always expected her to do everything just because she was the strongest and stuff. _Okay...what to do, what to do...damn it, why does my hand sting? Did I get cut or something? I must have. This stings like a mother fucker._ She picked up her dropped sword and behead three demons with one swing. She kicked a vampire in the chest before jabbing her sword off to the left and stabbing something that looked like a cross between a goat and a tiger.

"Jackie!" Andy yelled. He was conjuring and throwing fireballs right and left, probably damn near suffocating himself over there with the cloud of smoke that was around him. "Would you hurry up please? I would like to not die tonight if that's possible!"

"I'm working on it!" she told him. She really wished everyone would understand how hard it was to come up with a plan in the middle of this kind of chaos. Just because she had been doing it from the age of nine didn't mean it was something she found easy. Hell, it almost seemed to get harder as time went on. _Damn Apocalypse City...it never gives me a moment's peace. _

After about another minute of trying to think and fight at the same time, she got a decent idea. She took off running away from the chaos, causing several of the demons to chase her. Once she was closer to the hotel she called home, she jumped as hard as she could, launching herself up and landing on the roof. "Too high, too high," she muttered as she ran across the roof and got into the hotel through the door that was up there. That was the problem with her abilities. She couldn't always control what happened when she used them. Just now, she had meant to jump through the window of her own room. Unfortunately, she had overshot it, and now she had to run all the way down the two flights of stairs to get to her room.

_"Jackie!" _Christina yelled into Jackie's brain, just about bringing on the worst migrane of her life.

_"What?"_ Jackie responded, hoping she hurt Christina's head just as badly. Grandma Shirley and their mom had trained them to talk telepathically when they had been younger so they could always be in contact with each other. It wasn't something they did a lot of though, the headaches being the main reason why (the nearly unstoppable nosebleeds that usually followed the headaches were the second main reason).

_"I'm having another vision,"_ Christina whimpered.

Jackie sighed in frustration as she burst into her room. These visions were really starting to piss her off. Christina couldn't seem to make them stop and it was becoming a pain in the ass. _"What did you see this time? If you saw more demons coming my way, I'm shooting myself in the head. I'm not joking here"_

_"That won't kill you dumbass!"_ Christina reminded her. _"And I saw Caedes...he's sending some kind of really big stone looking demons to kill us. And he's sending Nightcrawlers after Connor and his family and he's going to get Jeff from the hospital he's in. We've got to do something!"_

_"In case you haven't noticed Chrissy, we're already kind of busy at the moment,"_ Jackie pointed out. She reached under her bed and grabbed her box of emergency items. She opened the box up and rummaged around it until she found what she was looking for. It was an glass jar full of a powder that came off of Chaos Demon (where on the demon it came off of was not something she ever intended to find out if she could help it). She took the jar over to her open window. _"Andy!"_

_"What?" he asked._

_"You got a gun nearby?"_

_"Hold on."_ There was a moment of silence on his part. _"Okay got it. I stole it from Robin."_

Jackie didn't actually care where he got it from, but she didn't say that. _"I'm throwing an jar out the window. Shoot it while it's in the air and then get out of the way."_

_"How in the hell is that going to help us?"_

_"Just do it damn it!"_ Jackie tossed the jar out the window as hard as she could, actually making it go all the way out to where the majority of the fighting was. She saw Andy quickly raise the gun and fire twice, hitting the urn on the first try. The jar exploded into pieces and the powder went flying everywhere. The demons were the first to inhale it and they immediately went from attacking the humans to attacking to each other. Why the hell the powder made them do that, she did not know. What she did know was that she needed to get more of it because that was the last of her supply.

Jackie leaned against her wall and took a deep breath. She wasn't going to get much time to rest besides from this. If Caedes was going to send demons after her, Andy and Christina, it was time to leave Rupes and their friends in charge of things on the home front and seek the demon bastard out so they could have a little face to face chat.

"Jackie!" Christina yelled at the top of her lungs, jumping over demon carcasses as she ran towards the hotel. "Come on down! We need to get going!"

"Give me three minutes!" Jackie yelled back.

"Three minutes?" Christina shouted incredulously. "For what?"

"Potty break and Snickers!" Jackie replied. The first was an absolute essential; this wasn't a total apocalypse quite yet so she felt like she could risk relieving herself in a place that was not in her pants. As for the second...well okay, she didn't need it, but she wanted one damn it. And if someone thought wanting that chocolate goodness was wrong, then they could go to hell. Besides, it wasn't like she was going to sit down and eat the mother fucker. It was just a little pick me up that could be eaten on the go so she wouldn't die of fucking hunger before the end of the world started. _It's the end of the world as we know it. It's the end of the world as we--oh fuck, not this again. Damn it, I'm really starting to hate this song._

XXXXXXXXXXXXXX

"So seriously, how do you know something happened to Jeff?" Cooper asked. "I mean seriously, there's no way you could know that."

Connor wrung his hands together while glancing out the window every couple of seconds. He was seriously freaking out at the moment. James was driving him, Mark and Cooper down to North Carolina to see Jeff (there hadn't been any flights directly to North Carolina soon enough for Connor's taste so they had flown to Virginia instead and then decided to drive from there). Connor could not shake the feeling that they were being followed. He was trying to ignore it, but he couldn't. It was getting stronger and stronger and that, combined with the visions from earlier, was making him scared. And being scared was not something he was able to handle well. "Faster Daddy," Connor begged, just about ripping the sleeves off his shirt completely because he started pulling on them so hard. "Please Daddy, go go go!"

"I am going!" James told him. "I'm going as fast as I can. I'm risking getting pulled over as it is and if a cop pulls us over, it's going to take us even longer to get to Jeff."

Connor whined and pulled at his hair in frustration. He didn't care about the cops and this wasn't about Jeff. "Something's following us," he announced. "It's something bad and that's why you have to _hurry_ Daddy!"

Mark looked back out the window. "Where Connor? There's nobody behind us for miles."

"It's...it's....oh no." Connor's eyes rolled into the back of his head and his body began seizuring uncontrollably. He heard someone cry out his name, but he couldn't telll who it was. A white hot searing pain settled in his brain and he screamed because it was beyond unbearable. This was what he had felt right before he had started seeing stuff last time and he had really hoped that this wouldn't happen again.

_It felt like he was flying. He knew he wasn't because he kept landing on the ground and then jumping back up again, but in those few moments he was airbourne, he was in a way flying over a pretty good distance. There were others like him too, jumping and going to the same place he was. Blue creatures...monsters, demons....probably demons. He didn't know how he knew that, but he did. Hissing and jumping even more, he saw a car in the distance. The other demons let out a yell and started moving faster and faster, he saw a car in the distance. It looked kind of familiar and as he got closer, he realized why._

_It was James's car._

Connor regained his bearings to find himself laying down on his back on the side of the road. Cooper, James and Mark were all gathered around him, looking extremely worried. "I knew this was a bad idea," James said with a shake of his head. "I knew you should have stayed in the hospital."

"We can take him to one nearby," Cooper suggested. "There can't be one too far away."

"No," Connor said, refusing help as he got back up to his feet. "No hospital. We got to keep going."

"Connor you're not well!" Mark snapped. "Something seriously is fucking wrong with you. People don't seizure like that for nothing."

Connor was about to snap at the Deadman when something caught his eye. He looked up all the way and saw that it was a blue figure seemingly flying to their car. "Oh no," he groaned. "No no no no--"

"What the hell is that?" James asked.

He didn't have to wait long to find out. The demon they saw landed directly on top of the car, actually putting a dent in the roof. A second demon landed near them, then a third, a fourth and then it was literally raining demons. Connor grabbed on to Cooper and held on tightly. This was not good. _One two three four five six seven eight...oh fuck me..._

They were completely and utterly surrounded.


	7. Chapter 7

James stared at the creatures that had surrounded him, Mark and the boys. They weren't like anything he had ever seen before in his life. "Marky," he said nervously, taking out his knife and holding on to it tightly. "What the hell are these things?"

"How in the hell am I supposed to know that?" Mark asked. He had his hands raised, ready to strike if the creatures got too close. Since his killing days were behind him for the most part, he really didn't carry anything sharp and pointy with him anymore. "Do I look like an expert on weird animals?"

"Not animals," Connor said. He was clinging to Cooper for dear life, obviously freaking out at the moment.

"Well what the hell are they then?" James asked. He grabbed a spare knife that was strapped to his left leg and handed it to Mark so he could have a weapon too. "And what the fuck do they want?"

"Masssterrrr ssssayssss you musssst die," one of the things hissed.

"Caedes," Connor whimpered. "He's sending demons to kill us."

The demons all hissed at Connor as soon as he spoke up. Apparently knowing whoever this Caedes guy was did not please the freaky blue things at all. "So this Caedes dude is your Master?" James said, trying to buy time so he could look for some sort of advantage. If these things really were demons, then he had no idea how strong they really were or what they could even do. _Fuck, I didn't even think demons were real. Is that what these things really are? And why the fuck are we the target? We didn't do anything....I don't think..._

One of the demons opened its mouth and its tongue came shooting out of his mouth like a rocket. James ducked just in time, actually freaked out at the moment. The tongue made a cracking sound as it hit nothing but air, and as it started going back into the demon's mouth, he grabbed a hold of it and sliced it in half with his knife. That made the one demon shriek in pain and the other demons shriek in rage. Before James could even blink, he and the others were being rushed at from all sides.

"Nice going Dad!" Cooper yelled. "You pissed them off!"

James didn't have time to say something back. The demon that was now missing its tongue lunged at him, and he raised his foot up in the air and kicked it down to the ground. Blue hands started grabbing him anywhere they could reach, and he jerked around violently to get away from them. He buried his knife into one of the demon's stomachs while stomping on the grounded demon's throat, killing both of them. A thick, gooey green substance spilled out on to his hand and he made a loud noise of disgust. _I am going to be so pissed if this shit turns out to be toxic._

He glanced back at the others. Mark was striking anything that came at within arms reach of him, and there was one demon laying by his feet, it's throat slashed and its eyes open wide with shock. Cooper and Connor were being a bit more reckless than Mark, just throwing themselves right back at the demons and colliding with them in mid-air. _At least Connor's not letting fear get the best of him._ That wasn't really a comforting thought though because Connor didn't get scared very often. And when he did, there was usually a really good fucking reason to be afraid.

Suddenly it felt like James's cheek got slashed with a knife. He jumped back, reaching up and finding that blood had been drawn. "Okay, which one of you fuckers did that?" he asked. "Huh? Which one of you mother fu--"

Two tongues shot out this time and wrapped themselves around both of his wrists. Before he could drag his feet or do anything that could stop what came next, he found himself being slingshotted into the air like a fucking marble. He came down hard on his back, and the fact that he skidded a bit gave him a pretty nasty road rash. "Mother fuckers," he muttered, rolling back up to his feet. "That is cheating."

One of the demons grabbed him from behind and tried to start squeezing the life out of him. He stomped on its foot and broke free from its grip, turning around and driving the blade of his knife into its neck without hesitation. Another one jumped at him and he whirled around and slit it's throat, spinning so much that he just about took himself off his own feet.

"Lawson!" Mark said, a sense of anxiety clearly evident in his voice.

James looked over and saw the four remaining demons hissing among themselves. He took a step forward, ready to just finish them off for good. But he stopped as he saw something that looked like it belonged to someone having an acid induced hallucination. The four demons began morphing together and growing right before his eyes. Within a matter of thirty seconds, they had turned themselves into one, ten foot tall demon who looked ready to crush all of them like bugs.

"Holy shit," Cooper said, looking up at it with wide eyes. "Uh....Daddy?"

"Lawson, how the fuck do we fight that thing?" Mark asked.

James looked at Connor, who was hiding behind Cooper. Then he looked at Cooper and Mark, who were looking at him like he was supposed to have all the fucking answers. "Uh....we charge it at once?" was all he could come up with at the moment.

Mark and Cooper looked at each other. They both shrugged at each other and then nodded at James. Apparently they had no better ideas. Connor began making sounds of protest but they ignored him. As it turned out, they probably should have listened to Connor. The giant demon swiped its hand once and knocked them back several feet with just that blow. James's head bounced off the cement hard enough to make him see stars, and it took him a couple of minutes to regain his composure. When he started to get back up to his feet, he saw the demon grab Connor by the neck and lift him up into the air. James lunged forward, not giving a shit about the consequences about moving so recklessly.

Just as he was within reach of the demon, there was a flash of blinding white light and he skidded to a stop because he couldn't see. The light lasted about three seconds, and when it disappeared, three people he had never seen before in his life were falling out of the sky and on to the demon. Their combined body weight forced the demon to drop Connor and fall to the ground.

"Okay, I officially hate traveling this way!" the lone male of the three newcomers announced. "I want you to know that Jackie."

"I know I--whoa!" Jackie shouted as the demon bucked up and started to get back up. Andy and the other girl fell off of the demon, but Jackie wrapped her legs around it and managed to hang on that right. "Okay, you have got to go!" she announced. She reached up and put one arm around the demon's forehead and the other on it's thick meaty neck. There was a loud and painful sounding crack as she snapped its neck with one twist. "And we all fall down!" she exclaimed happily as the demon fell forward, forcing everyone else to move out of the way to avoid being squashed.

There was a long, shocked silence right after that. Finally Cooper just had to open his big mouth. "Did that demon just get owned by a girl?"

Jackie got to her feet, an offended look clearly written on her face. "Hey! What the fuck is that supposed to mean?"

Andy held up his hands. "Easy there sis, there's no need--"

"He's implying that I shouldn't have been able to kill that thing!" Jackie whined. "Just because I have a vagina and a pair of tits does not mean I should be judged by them!"

James raised his eyebrows and studied her closely. She was about six feet tall, maybe a hundred and fifty pounds (although the heavy boots she was wearing probably made her weigh slightly more than she would without them) and she had really long dark hair that reminded him of what Annabelle's hair used to look like back in high school. _Although Annabelle never wore leather pants that tight or shirts that revealing...no wonder she's judged by her tits. They're practically coming out of her shirt!_

"Hey, creepy mother fucker! Quit staring at the merchendise! Any more looking is going to get you in big fucking trouble." Jackie kicked the dead demon and cracked her knuckles. "Andy, my gaydar is going off the charts here, and it's not because of you. If I can't score with these guys, will you bang them for me?"

Andy blinked before turning a deep shade of red. "Jackie! That's not--"

"Oh come on, it'll be fun! I mean, you won't get to top any of them because none of them strike me as bottom boys, but that's okay because you love being fucked!"

"Jackie!" Andy yelled again. "Must you keep running your mouth?"

"Uh yeah, actually I must. When have you known me to ever shut up?"

Mark stepped over to James so he could whisper in his ear. "You know, I've had a couple of teenaged daughters with a couple of my ex-wives, and none of them ever turned out to be this mouthy."

"Maybe she's a new breed of them," James whispered back. He looked over at Connor. His youngest boy was staring at the other girl with wide eyes. "Connor?"

Jackie raised her eyebrows. "That's Connor?"

James frowned. "What--"

"You're vision girl," Connor said, completely ignoring everyone else but Christina.

Christina grinned. "I told you that I was real."

"Yeah, but lots of things tell me they're real. And then they're not real."

"Well I'm not one of those things. I'm--"

"Confusing the fuck out of me," Cooper interrupted. "Seriously, what the fuck is going on here? Who the fuck are you people and why the fuck were there demons attacking us?"

"Yeah, what he said," James said. "But I'm going to put more of a threat on it."

Jackie looked like she was going to take exception to being threatened but Andy spoke up before she could say anything. "Look, I'm Andy, she's Jackie and that's Christina. We--"

"Christina sees things," Connor spoke up. "Sees bad things. Like me. The bad things are after Jeff."

"Caedes," Christina clarified. "A demon. He was supposed to be dead but he came back somehow."

"Okay," Mark said slowly, his eyes still on the giant dead demon on the ground in front of them. "And what the fuck is that thing supposed to be?"

Jackie looked down at the demon she had killed and then at the demons James and them had killed. "Oh I've seen these mother fuckers before! They're uh...uh....uh..."

"Nightcrawlers," Christina and Andy said at the same time.

Jackie glared at both of them. "That's what I was going to say!"

"Yeah sure, whatever," Christina said with a roll of her eyes. She looked at James. "Look, we really don't have a lot of time here, so I'm going to make this short. A long fucking time ago, Caedes gathered an army and tried to wipe humanity off the face of the earth. Our grandma and her two sisters and three dudes with the last name Lawson sent him to hell, and now that he's back, he's sending demons after us so he can avoid getting killed again."

James exchanged looks with Cooper and Mark before looking back at her. "And we should believe ANY of this because..."

"Because you all so totally almost got killed before I saved the day," Jackie said. "I mean, do you have demons come after you if something isn't out to kill you?"

"Well no, but that's because demons are not supposed to be real."

"Well they are real!" Connor said suddenly. "And more will be after us soon and Jeff's still in trouble so we need to go now!" He balled up his fists, obviously ready to punch the first person who disagreed with him.

James sighed. Hell, none of this made any sense to him whatsoever, but judging from the look on Connor's face, sense would need to be found later. Connor was going to freak if they just didn't get their asses moving. "Everyone in the car," he ordered gruffly. "We'll sort this shit out later. I just want to get the fuck out of here before we get attacked again."

Jackie grinned. "Oh--" She stopped and looked at Connor. "What the fuck is his name?"

"James," Connor told her. "And that's Mark and that's Cooper."

"Awesome." Jackie patted James on the shoulder. "James, as insane as we and all this seems, trust me on one thing: you will be getting attacked a fuck load more demons before everything is said and done."

And for some reason, James really did trust her when it came to that.

XXXXXXXXXXXXX

"Chris, you really need to take a break," Shane said gently. "Come on, you need to eat something and stretch your legs just for a bit."

Chris shook his head. He was still holding Jeff in his arms. Jeff had cried himself to sleep again just a little while ago. "I'm fine," Chris said dully. "Don't worry about me."

"Someone needs to," Shannon said, backing Shane up. "Come on Chris, just take a breather for a few minutes. You're cracking on us."

"Am not." But that just sounded like a lie to his own ears. Truth be told, Chris wanted to break down too, but he had done his best to hold it back because Jeff needed him to be strong. _Yeah, like that's really been helping,_ a nasty voice inside his brain said. _He needed you when he was getting attacked, but you weren't there, were you?_

Matt sighed and walked over to Chris. "I'll hold him, okay?" he offered quietly. "Just take a little breather and let out anything you need to let out. You know I'll take care of him."

Chris knew that, but that didn't make him want to let Jeff go. Unfortunately, he knew the others would just keep nagging him about it until he took their advice, so he got up and let Matt take his place. "I won't be gone long," he muttered as he left the room. Nobody made any attempts to follow him and that was good. He walked through the hostpital hallways as fast as he could, absolutely despising the smell of the place. He had thought there was nothing that could make him hate hospitals more than having to come to one the night his mom got paralyzed, but this whole situation just about did it.

He burst out the front door and barely made it over to the grassy area before throwing up violently. He heaved and heaved and heaved, almost positive his intestines were going to come out in the process. When he was finally done, he walked away from the pile of vomit before collapsing and sobbing like a damn baby. He felt like such a fucking failure. From the very beginning of their relationship, Chris had sworn to protect Jeff from harm. And until now, he had been able to do that. _It figures that the one time I fail, he gets hurt as badly as anyone can be hurt. Oh God...my poor Jeff..._

Chris didn't know how long he just sat there crying. It felt like foerever, but it probably was only about ten or twenty minutes at the most. When he was finally done, he wiped his eyes with the back of his hand and looked around. It was really dark out and the only thing that allowed him to see anything were the lights that were coming from the hospital. Despite not being able to see anything threatening, a sudden chill went down his spine. For reasons he couldn't really explain, he felt like he was being watched. Creeped out, he got to his feet and went back inside the hospital. That failed to make him feel any better. In fact, the feeling was almost worse now. _I am being so stupid, there's no--_

A loud scream made him just about jump out of his skin. He looked over and saw what almost appeared to be a giant panther jumping on a nurse and mauling the shit out of her. Within three seconds of that, there were more of the giants cats, and they were attacking anyone they could sink their teeth into. Chris immediately took off running towards Jeff's room, barely avoiding getting jumped on himself several times.

"Chris!" Mor yelled, sticking his head out into the hallway. "What--"

"Get back in there!" Chris shouted. He nearly slipped as he turned to enter the room himself, but he regained his footing just in time to shove Mor back in all the way and enter the room himself. He began to slam the door shut, but something really strong violently pushed back as he did so, and he found himslef being thrown back up against the bed. That woke Jeff right back up. "Chris what--" His voice died in his throat suddenly and he began to whimper.

_What the fuck?_ Chris said to himself as some sort of weird looking creature entered the room and grinned at all of them.

"Hello Jeff," the thing said pleasantly.

All Jeff did in response was scream.


	8. Chapter 8

Jeff shook violently in fear. This could not be happening. This had to be a nightmare. He was going to wake up in a minute and none of this was going to be happening. He closed his eyes tightly, counted to ten in his head and then reopened his eyes. Nope, Caedes was still there. This wasn't a nightmare. This was really happening.

Caedes smiled. "Hello Jeff. I've been wondering when we were going to see each other again. I know our last encounter wasn't exactly easy on you, but hearing you scream was---whoa! Easy there cowboy!"

Chris had attempted to lunge at Caedes while he talking but had been restrained by Matt and Jeff at the last second. "Let me go!" Jericho shouted. He was doing everything in his power to break free from both Hardys. "Let me at him!"

Mor tilted his head to the side. "Wait, you're the thing that raped Jeff? Yuck! No wonder Jeff's traumatized. You're fucking ugly dude!"

Caedes gave Mor a nasty look and Shane quickly pulled the Shaman of Sexy back towards him and Shannon. "Mor, I know this might be hard for you to comprehend, but now is not the time to be commenting on someone's looks."

"But look at him!" Mor whispered. "He--ow!" He glared at Shannon, who had just elbowed him in the stomach. "Watch the abs man!"

Caedes stared at Mor before shaking his head. "You are very annoying. I think I'm going to kill you first and just get it over with."

Matt's eyes narrowed. Nobody threatened Mor while he was around. He let go of Chris and the two of them started advancing towards Caedes. Jeff tried to regain a hold of them but he couldn't manage to do it. He whimpered and scooted as far back as he could. Caedes didn't look intimidated at all by Matt and Chris coming at him. In fact, the demon seemed to be amused. On the other hand, the panther creatures with him didn't seem to be that amused. They were starting to come towards Mor, Shannon and Shane, growling and snarling and baring their teeth. _Wait, where's Dad though?_ Jeff asked himself. He looked around. The Legend wasn't there anymore. Where the hell had he gone?

"Matt don't!" Shane yelled suddenly.

Jeff looked back over just in time to see Matt attempt to take a swing at Caedes. Caedes easily blocked Matt's arm by grabbing it roughly and snapping it in half. Matt screamed in pain and Caedes easily tossed him over on to Mor, Shane and Shannon. "Matty!" Jeff yelled. He looked over at Chris, who was now getting grabbed by the throat by Caedes. "No! Let him go!"

"Why?" Caedes asked. He lifted Chris up into the air and dangled him there. "I--"

A loud bang went off and Caedes dropped Chris. Jeff's jaw dropped in shock as Gil returned with a shotgun in his hands. "Legend!" Shane exclaimed. "You were supposed to be home taking a shower!"

"Yeah well, I got a feeling something bad was happening here," Gil replied. He shot Caedes a couple more times. "And it looks like I was right."

Caedes, who had only stumbled back slightly since getting shot, snarled and lunged at Gil. The two of them went flying out of the room and the panther creatures followed them. "DAD!" Jeff screamed. He got out of bed and took off running as fast as he could (which wasn't that fast because of the pain he was in and the severe limp he was crippled with now). Chris and the others were running after him and they all got ahead of Jeff. Jeff didn't give a shit though. He just needed to get to his father. "DAD!"

"Go back!" Caedes suddenly yelled. "Go back and kill them all except for Jeff! Do it now!" He had Gil by the shirt and was yanking the old man back up to his feet.

"Matt go!" Gil shouted as loud as he could, his voice betraying how much that tackle from Caedes really took out of him. "Take Jeff and run!"

Matt skidded to a halt at the same time the panther things did. There was about two seconds where the panthers kept sliding on the hard floor that Matt hesitated. "Dad--"

"I said go!" Gil shouted. "If you love me, you will not let this thing get your little brother!"

"Wait no!" Jeff protested as Chris scooped him into his arms and took off running. Matt, Mor, Shane and Shannon were all following them. "Dad! DAD!" He glanced back and saw three things. One was that Mor, Shannon and Shane were pretty much dragging Matt along. The dark haired Hardy obviously was not that willing to leave his dad behind.

The second thing Jeff saw was that despite still slipping a bit, the panthers were rapidly regaining their footing. And they were starting to speed up. It was only a matter of seconds before they caught up with them and tried to tear their throats out.

The third thing though was the worst one of them all. Jeff saw Caedes grab Gil's head and rip it right off his shoulders.

"NOOOO!" Jeff screamed. He thrashed around so violently that Chris ended up dropping him. "DAD! NO! DADDY!"

XXXXXXXXXXX

Thirty five miles away from the hospital, Christina and Connor were both having fits in the backseat of James's car. Mark had turned around and was trying to help Andy and Cooper get a hold of the distressed duo while James and Jackie were having a little argument about what they should do.

"What is the point of pulling over?" Jackie asked impatiently. "We've got a handle on this thing back here. Just keep going!"

"Oh you have a handle on it?" James asked in a nasty voice. "If you have such a handle on it, then why the fuck is my son still having a seizure back there?"

Jackie sighed. "Look, I know you're worried, but the vision should stop here soon. The first few are the nastiest but he's had...wait, how many has he had?"

"Two," Cooper replied. He was doing his best to get a hold of his baby brother. "That's how many of the seizure things he's had anyway."

"Okay, so this is his third," Jackie said. She climbed up more into the front so she could look at James more. "Look, Christina has had these since she was six, so I fucking know how to deal with someone who has them. You have to let it pass on its own. I know it sucks and it's scary hell, but pulling over isn't going to make it stop."

Mark could tell that James did not like that answer very much. "But WHY is Connor having these things?" he asked, hoping to stall James from flying into a rage. "You're the supposed expert here. Tell us why this is happening."

"Well the most common reason is genetics," Jackie said, keeping a wary eye on James. "On my mom's side of the family, there have been seventeen seers that I know of and that's not counting Christina."

"So someone in James's family had to be a seer," Mark said.

"Generally yes when the reason is genetics, but there's one other way genetics play the role in it," Andy piped up. "There have been about a hundred documented cases in history of a child born from incest having visions."

James just about swerved the car. "Incest?" he said quietly.

"Yeah," Jackie confirmed. "The wiring of the brain gets all weird and fried and it leaves the people more sensitive to psychic energy. The only way I've ever heard of the incest doing it though is that the relatives have to be really fucking closely related. Cousins don't cut it. The child has to come from a father/daughter, mother/son or brother/sister relationship." She tilted her head to the side. "Am I hitting some nerves here James?"

James didn't say anything. He just gripped the steering wheel so tightly that his knuckles turned white. He had a really dark look on his face that made Mark kind of nervous.

"Caedes killed Jeff's daddy," Connor said miserably. He had his face buried into Cooper's shirt so it was kind of hard to understand him. "Legend go bye bye. I liked the Legend. Make him come back Daddy. I want Legend to come back."

Christina rubbed her forehead while reaching out and poking Jackie with her foot. "You gotta get us to the hospital," she told her older sister. "We don't got time to drive. We'll be too late if we keep this up. You gotta teleport us there."

"Wait, you can teleport?" Cooper said incredulously. "If that's the case, why the fuck--"

"Didn't we teleport to the hospital already?" Andy finshed.

"Yeah!"

"Teleporting can go wrong," Jackie explained. "If someone doesn't have enough control, the people they're taking with them can get lost and never get found again. And even if the person has control, the more people they teleport with them, the more chance there is to someone getting lost anyway. "

"Well in that case, I want to veto the whole teleporting thing," James announced.

"We can't veto it," Christina insisted. "It's the only thing we can do now that they're out of time. Jackie come on, I know that you can do it. The car should keep us all together."

Jackie sighed. "Hopefully it does," she muttered. "Or it could fuse us all together and we look like one giant Siamese setuplets."

Mark winced. _If we end up as a giant set of septuplets, I'm going to be pissed. I'm not even joking right now._

XXXXXXXXX

Chris was struggling to keep Jeff moving. He didn't know whether it was because Jeff was struggling so hard or because his whole body had gone weak. The Legend was dead. Caedes had killed him. All thoughts of running had been abandoned. Matt and Jeff were trying to go back even though it was too late. The panthers were almost on them, so it was almost pointless to keep running. They were going to get mauled either way.

"Oh God, we need some fucking weapons," Shannon muttered as Shane grabbed a nearby fire extinguisher.

Chris shook his head. "Fuck weapons. We're going to need a fucking miracle here."

Almost as soon as the words left his mouth, there was a flash of white and a car came crashing down right into the hospital, landing on top of three of the panthers and squashing them. Seconds later, all four Lawsons and Mark stumbled out of the vehicle (looking like they were about to be sick--obviously that method of travel hadn't done them any good) and then three more people got out of the car. Chris's jaw dropped. He knew them. He hadn't seen them since they were little kids, but that didn't change the fact he knew them by sight. "Oh...my...God..."

Jackie, Christina and Andy's eyes all widened when they saw him. They opened their mouths and all let out the same yell.

"Uncle Chris!"


	9. Chapter 9

"Uncle?" Shannon, Shane, Mark, James, Cooper, Connor and Mor all repeated incredulously.

Chris ignored them and just kind of waved at Andy, Jackie and Christina. "Hey guys."

"Geez Uncle Chris, I thought you stopped visiting us because you wanted to avoid all this demonic insanity," Jackie said as she turned away from the wrestlers and faced off with Caedes and his pets. Caedes looked annoyed but the panthers definitely looked hesitant. _They sense what I am,_ she realized as she growled just loud enough for them to hear. That growling caused them to take a couple steps back. _Oh yeah, they know what I really am._

"Yeah well, it kind of invaded my life," Chris replied. "Believe me, I did ask for this bullshit."

Caedes looked like he was trying to raise his eyebrows--only he didn't actually have any eyebrows to raise (that Jackie could see anyway). "Well you know, you can just hand Jeff over and--"

Matt lunged at Caedes, and barely got restrained by the others. It sounded like he was trying to say something, but he was so angry that none of the words that came out of his mouth were coherent at all. Jackie wondered for a second what the hell that was all about then Andy tugged on her shirt and indicated with his head to look at a body that was laying not too far away from them. She looked and then winced. Since she had been a Hardy Boyz fan for a good ten years now (she was actually wearing one of their t-shirts at the moment), she recognized the dead guy as their dad Gil. "Oh come on, why would you do that?" she asked Caedes. "What does killing a seventy something old dude prove besides the fact you're a total pussy?"

Caedes tried to look like he was innocent. "Come on now Jackie, how do you know it was me? That's very rude to accuse someone without knowing for sure."

Jackie shook her head. She wasn't even going to ask how he knew her name. After fighting evil for as long as she had and killing as many nasty things as she had, her reputation pretty much preceeded her at this point. "Dude seriously, there would be less--" She stopped mid-sentence and surprised him with a kick to the gut that sent him flying across the room. "--of him if your cats had gotten their paws on him."

The panthers growled and started to lunge at her despite their earlier hesitation. Jackie was going to hit them, but a blast of fire hit them while they were in mid-air, and she had to move out of the way and let them crash down to the ground so she wouldn't get burned.

"Ooooohhhhh fire!" Connor squealed happily. "Daddy look, it came out of Andy's hands!"

James just blinked stupidly. "Uh....what the fuck?"

"You stole the words right out of my mouth," Mark muttered.

Andy grinned. While he wasn't quite as good as Jackie was in a fight, the fact that he could make and manipulate fire with his hands was handy as hell. "Oh yeah, I rule," he declared.

Jackie rolled her eyes. "Get everyone else out of here," she told Christina. "Do it now." She didn't wait for Christina to say anything in response to that. She just lunged at Caedes, who was back on his feet and waiting for her. He grabbed her in mid-air and attempted to toss her behind him so that she was out of the way if he wanted to go for Jeff, but she managed to grab a hold of him and they both went crashing down to the floor.

"Okay ow," she said unhappily. "That floor hurt like a bitch." Hospital floors were not the best things to land on. _Although at least they don't hurt as bad as concrete or brick. Now those hurt like a mother fucker._

"Okay people, let's move it," Christina ordered. "Come on, nothing to see here. Let's run like hell before we get attacked or accidentally set on fire."

"No!" Matt refused. "I'm going to fucking kill--"

"Jackie will take care of it!" Christina snapped. She grabbed Matt and tried to physically pull him away. It was almost comical because he was a good half a foot taller than she was. "And Andy will help if he can. Now let's go! Don't make me hit you!"

"Come on Hardy," James ordered. "I'm not one to run away from a fight, but even this bullshit is a little much for me."

As Matt kept trying to object, Jackie and Caedes both grabbed each other by the throat. Jackie could feel his fingernails digging into her throat. Not liking that shit at all, she shoved Caedes up against the wall. She punched him in the face several times before trying to end this early and snap his neck. He kneed her in the stomach though and then smashed her face first into the wall. He attempted to go after Jeff but Andy sent a fireball in his direction, which distracted him just long enough for Jackie to tackle him down to the ground. "You got the cats Andy?" she asked as she fought to maintain control of Caedes.

"Yeah," Andy said with a nod. "They're getting nice and crispy at the moment."

"Goody. When they're dead go make sure Christina and the others get out of here okay." She grabbed Caedes by the back of the neck and tossed him up into the air as violently as she could. He hit the ceiling and then met her foot on the way back down. "Goal!" she shouted as she kicked him so hard that he went crashing through an exam room window.

"Uh....what about the car?" Andy asked.

"Well if the mother fucking thing still starts after that crash landing, take it with you," Jackie replied as she ran to where she had sent Caedes. "I'm sure that--umph!" She got smashed right in the face with a stretcher hard enough to knock her down on her ass. It hit her right in the middle of her face, and it broke her nose right on impact. _Mother fucker,_ she thought as she felt the blood from her nose go down to her mouth. _I hate it when they go for the face. That is just way too personal._

"Jackie!" Andy yelled.

"Just go!" she ordered before he could even try to take a step towards her. "Make sure Christina stays safe." She gave him a look that silently said "I've got this".

He hesitated for just a moment before doing what she told him to do. She got back up to her feet only to get hit with the stretcher again. This time she got hit right in the ribs. _Mother fucker has a hell of a swing._

"You know, you've made quite a name for yourself," Caedes commented. He seemed to have given up on trying to go after Jeff for the moment in favor of enjoying this fight. "Jackie Chase, the most infamous demon hunter since Van Helsing."

"Don't butter me up," Jackie replied. She grabbed the stretcher as he was swinging it again. "I hate kiss asses. She snatched it out of his hands and smacked him right in the face with it.

Caedes stumbled back. "Believe me, the last thing I would ever do would be kiss your ass." He ducked her next swing and then kicked the stretcher out of her hands. "I'm just thinking out loud." They began trading punches and kicks. "You know, you really do have an impressive resume. It's absolutely legendary. But I just have to wonder why you even do it? I mean, you are a demon after all."

Jackie scowled. That was not something she cared to be reminded of. "I'm only half demon you piece of shit," she snapped. She uppercutted him so hard that she almost took him off his feet again. "And believe me, I have no interest in being like my father."

"Too bad," Caedes said. It didn't really sound like he was being genuine in saying that. "Harvey--"

Jackie's attacks became quicker and even more violent, making him shut the hell up right then and there. Harvey was her biological father and he was a demon. And the less she was reminded of him, the better. Even though she had sent him to hell herself, the shit he had put her through over the years was still fresh in her mind and it still bothered her. "You know, with my reputation, you probably should have known that that's the last name you have said," she growled. She grabbed his wrist as he tried to hit her and then punched her hand right through his chest. She was intending on ripping his heart right out of his chest.

There was just one small problem: there was no heart in there to rip out.

Caedes shook his head. "Sorry honey. But I'm not making that mistake all over again." Before Jackie could do anything else, drove something sharp right into her stomach. She doubled over in pain, her hand slipping out of Caedes's chest in the process. Her blood (black because of the demon side of her) spilled out of her, staining the tile floor. She sighed. She hated getting stabbed. It had happened way too many times for her to count and it was never a fun experience.

Caedes leaned forward so he could whisper in her ear. "I will get Jeff. I promise you that. No matter where he goes...not matter what anyone does for him...he will be mine. I'll make sure of it." He started to walk away but she didn't let him get far. She yanked the dagger out of her stomach and stabbed him right in the neck with it. She wasn't one hundred percent that just stabbing him was going to work. When demons didn't have hearts, they either needed to be dismembered completely (which was usually the case with demons that never had a heart in the first place) or if the demon's heart had been removed and then hidden somewhere else, the person who wanted to do the killing would need to find the heart and then destroy it.

_"JACKIE!"_ Christina suddenly screamed inside Jackie's head. _"We've got a problem!"_

_"Yeah, I've got a problem too,"_ Jackie replied. _"I got stabbed and I just stabbed Caedes back and he's not dying. The only thing I've actually got going for me at the moment is that I'm not going to die from this wound._

_"Well could you finish up there really quick and come help us? We need--"_

Christina's voice was cut off so suddenly that it scared Jackie half to death. _"Christina? Christina? Oh damn it!"_ Abandoning her original next move (which would have been attempting to rip Caedes apart from limb to limb) to running off in the direction Christina and the others had taken off in. Killing Caedes was just going to have to wait. She needed to go find out what was going on with her siblings and the others.

XXXX

Jeff seriously didn't know how much more he could take. The rape had traumatized the hell out of him and seeing his dad get killed shattered his world, so having to deal with giant horned demons who looked like they were made out of pure stone was just too much for him to take. He cowered behind Chris, absolutely terrified for his life. There was so much fighting going on around him that it was hard to keep track of what was going on. He did know that Matt was attempting to take all of his anger and frustration out on the demons and it wasn't working that well. Everyone was getting their asses kicked really badly.

"Matty!" Jeff screamed as Matt was tossed all the way across the parking lot. Mor and Shane were hanging off the demon that had just done the throwing, but that didn't last for long. The demon tossed them off too, only they didn't go quite as far as Matt did. They did hit a truck though and Mor's elbow caused the window to shatter.

"Let go of her!" Connor shouted. He was trying to save Christina, who was getting choked by another one of the demons. "Daddy! Help me!"

"We're kind of busy here!" James replied. He cursed as he barely avoided getting his head taken off completely. "Damn it! I'm officially sick of this demon bullshit!"

"Pussy!" Andy yelled. His attempts to set the demons near him on fire were failing miserably.

"What the fuck did you just say to me?"

"I called you a pussy! You don't get to be sick of this yet! You've been doing this for a day! Try doing it for your whole life and then talk to me!"

Mark and Cooper hit the demon they were fighting on its knees at the same time and then both attempted to stab it. All that did was bend the blades of their knives in half. "Son of a bitch!" they shouted at the same time.

"Oh God, we're going to die," Jeff whimpered. He and Chris had been able to avoid the fighting for awhile, but that wasn't going to last for much longer. There were a couple of the demons that had finally noticed them and they were headed in their direction.

"No we're not," Chris said stubbornly. "We're going to get out of this."

"How?"

"I don't know yet. I'm still working on that part."

Jeff gulped. _Oh yeah, we're definitely fucked._

"GET OUT OF THE WAY! MOVE IT PEOPLES!"

Jeff turned around and ducked just as Jackie hurled James's car right at the demons. It hit several of them, knocking them down like bowling pins. The demons that didn't get hit suddenly became a lot more interested in Jackie. "Let's go!" she shouted. "We gotta go!"

Chris immeidately picked Jeff up and looked at his niece. "Where are we going to go?"

"I don't know yet!" Jackie started fighting the remaining demons so the others had time to regroup enough to run. "We need weapons though and we need to figure out a way to kill Caedes."

"He's not dead?"

"No but he's going to be as soon as I figure out how the fuck he's keeping himself alive with no heart in his chest!"

Jeff buried his face into Chris's neck. If Caedes wasn't dead yet, that meant he wasn't safe yet. It meant Caedes would come for him again. And if that happened, he was definitely going to lose his mind for good.


	10. Chapter 10

"Where the hell are we going?" James asked. He was not currently pleased with the situation he was currently in. He and the others were currently jammed into the mini van that Jackie had stolen. His car had been tossed at giant rock demons like it had weighed nothing at all and he didn't even want to think about how it was now.

"Uh...we're still working on that plan," Christina admitted. She and Andy were in the passenger's seat up front and Jackie was driving. Matt, Jeff, Chris, Mor and Shannon were squeezed in the seat right behind them and James, Connor, Mark, Cooper and Shane had been shoved in the very back of the vehicle.

"You're still working on it?" Mark repeated. He sounded really irritated at the moment. "What the hell does that mean?"

"It means exactly what it sounds like damn it," Jackie snapped. "Do we look like the magic plan people?"

"Uh....yeah?" Shannon said with a shrug. "I mean, who else is going to come up with a plan?"

Jackie sighed. "Uncle Chris!"

"Man, that is so weird to hear that," Shane muttered. He looked at Chris, who was trying to help Mor comfort Matt and Jeff. "I didn't even know that he HAD any siblings."

"Mom had Brandon when she was a teenager," Chris said without looking away from Jeff. He was holding the youngest Hardy in his arms and stroking his hair. "She couldn't take care of him so she put him up for adoption. I didn't even meet him until I was a teenager."

"Wow, that's really interesting," James said sarcastically. He tried to shift around in his seat, but he couldn't, so that irritated him even more. If they didn't get to where they were going soon, he was going to kill a few people just so he could have more room.

Mark elbowed him in the chest. "Behave," he grunted.

James glared at him. "No."

"Excuse me?"

"You heard me." James almost said that after the day he had, he was entitled to act like an asshole, but then he realized that Matt and Jeff pretty much already had a worst day than he did. And if they weren't acting like assholes yet, he would get yelled at for using that excuse. And with the way his head was pounding right now, the last thing he wanted was to get yelled at.

"I wants to hear a story," Connor announced.

"Connor hush," Cooper ordered.

"Why? Maybe a story would make Matt and Jeff less sad."

"Oh yes, because a story is going to make us forget all about our dad getting slaughtered," Matt said as he turned back to glare at Connor. "Do you even listen to yourself sometimes?"

James sighed as Connor wilted and buried his face into Cooper's shoulder. "He was just trying to help," he told Matt. "Don't get pissed at him because he doesn't know better."

"Maybe if you had taught him better--"

"Once upon a time my mommy had an an affair with a demon," Christina said loudly. "And she ended up getting pregnant with Jackie."

Jackie glared at her younger sister. "Did you really have to do that? That's not something I actually like advertised to people."

James raised his eyebrows. If what Christina was saying was true, that meant Jackie was half demon. "Your mom fucked a demon? What, was she blind or something?"

"You know, seeing as how she tossed your car around like it weighed nothing and killed a giant demon that was going to whoop our ass, I would probably not ask questions like that," Mark whispered.

James frowned. "Why not? You've seen the demons that keep fucking attacking us. I wouldn't fuck those things even if you paid me!" He began trying to look around everyone in front of him so he could get a look at Jackie. "So did Harvey have any horns or anything? Or was he slimy? And why in the hell would there be a demon named Harvey? That's a terrible name for a demon. Caedes may be a prick, but at least his name is original."

"Mark, if you want your boyfriend to stay in one piece, I'd shut him up right now if I were you," Chris warned.

James scowled. "Nobody asked you asshole."

Chris sighed and turned around to face James. "Think of Harvey as Jackie's Caroline. That should tell you exactly why she doesn't want to talk about it."

James sighed and shut up. For about two seconds anyway. "It's really hot in here."

Mark sighed. "And you say I nag..."

"I'm not nagging!" James claimed. "I was simply make an observation."

"How about I make an observation of my foot going into your ass?"

"Like you co--"

"Could you two please shut up?" Jeff yelled. His voice sounded like it was two seconds away from breaking. "Please?"

"He started it," James said, pointing at Mark.

Mark grabbed James by the throat and began to throttle him. "You fucking little--"

"That's it!" Jackie shouted. "If I hear one more word out of either of you that's not something helpful, I'm going to pull this car over and rip out your intestines and shove them down your fucking throats! And if you think I'm fucking joking, just try me!"

James and Mark quieted down, although the war of words was far from over. It would just pick back up later when Jackie wasn't around. _Maybe it's a good thing she stopped us,_ James thought to himself as he did his best to lean back and get more comfortable. _I was about to have to rape Marky and I don't think the others would have appreciated me doing that right on top of them._

"I want to go back for my dad's body," Matt announced. He didn't really look at anyone as he said this. It almost looked like he was talking to his own hands. "We need to bury him."

"I know how you feel," Jackie said gently. "I really fucking do. But if we go back, someone else will die. And Caedes might get his hands on your brother and rape the shit out of him again."

Andy pinched the bridge of his nose as Jeff whimpered. "You know, you could have worded that a little bit more gently."

Jackie shrugged. "I know, but going back is not an option. At least it's not now." She looked at the rearview mirror. "Hell, just driving around like this is dangerous. If Caedes can get a sense of where we are, we're fucked."

"We could go home," Christina suggested.

Chris groaned. "Oh dear God," he muttered.

Christina looked back at him. "You got a better idea?"

"No, but that doesn't mean I have to like that one."

Cooper raised his hand. "Can I just ask where the hell "home" is?"

"Ever heard of Apocalypse City?"

Mor, Shannon, Shane, Matt and Connor gave him blank looks while James gave him a "What the fuck are you talking about?" look. Meanwhile, Cooper and Mark both exchanged looks before giving him disbelieving looks. "That's just an urban legend," Cooper replied. It doesn't--"

"It exists," Chris interrupted. "Believe me, I've been there before. It's as real as can be."

Christina cleared her throat and made sure all eyes were on her before she started talking. "Okay, here's the condensed version of things: Apocalypse City is the supernatural capital of the world. It was where the ancient demons were born, where they died or got cast out, and it's supposed to be where the final apocalypse takes place."

"And we've never heard of it because...?" Shane prompted it.

"Conspiracy mostly," Mark spoke up. "Since 1836, the government has made seven attempts at going into Apocalypse City and gaining control of it. They've always claimed that it was to do research and keep the people safe--"

Jackie snorted. "Keep people safe my ass. Four years ago they sent a specialized group in and tried to exterminate us and the city. They wanted us dead because they realized that they were never going to get control of us or the city itself."

"And the city is so loaded with mojo that it's not even funny," Chris added. "If someone was able to tap into it, they would pretty much be unstoppable."

James gave Mark a funny look. "How did you even know anything about this?" he asked

"By watching Conspiracy Theory," Mark confessed. "The big conspiracy about it is that the government denies the entire city and its citizens, and doesn't even count the people as citizens of the United States."

"Harsh," Shannon muttered.

"Oh yeah," Andy agreed.

"If we go there and Caedes finds out about it, will he still come for Jeff?" Matt asked.

"Probably," Christina admitted. "But we know Apocalypse City better than he does. If he comes, we'll at least have a home field advantage."

Jackie shook her head. "You know, that sounds great on papter, but we still need to GET there."

"Teleport again?" Connor asked.

James groaned. His stomach turned violently at just hearing that word. "Please don't," he said. "I will spew if you do that bullshit again."

"I can't anyway," Jackie said. "There's too many of you for my brain to keep track of. If I even try it, my brain will turn to jelly for awhile and I'll be out of the game until I heal up."

"How about a portal?" Christina suggested.

Andy shook his head. "Do you even remember what happened the last time we used one? We got attacked!"

"Yeah well, we're going to get attacked if we just keep driving like this!" Christina pointed out. "We're damned if we do and damned if we don't."

"How fast is a portal?" Chris asked.

"Well it's not as fast as teleporting, but it should get us home in a few minutes," Christina answered. "Plus there's no feeling sick afterwards."

"But there's a chance that some demons could try to rip the car apart in order to get to us," Andy pointed out.

James waved his hand dismissively. "Screw the damn demons! I like this portal idea. I say we do it."

"Yeah really," Cooper said. "If I spend too much longer back here, I'm tossing Mark out of the window."

Mark glared at him. "What did I to you lately?"

Cooper just shrugged and looked at Connor. "What do you think?"

"I think I need to pee," Connor announced.

"I think we're all in agreement," Christina said when nobody but Andy had any flat out objections. She looked at Jackie. "Come on Magic Momma. Make it happen."

Jackie glared at her. "Do not call me that. You calling me Momma is creepy."

"Well maybe if you would just--"

"I'm trying to remember the fucking incantation so I can DO it! Do you want me to screw it up and turn us into toads?"

James rested his head on Mark's shoulder. "I don't want to be a toad," he informed his long time lover. "Toads suck. I want to be a tiger."

Mark raised his eyebrows. "Well I don't feel like being an animal and I'm not into beastiality, so if you want our relationship to continue, I suggest you get that idea out of your head right now."

"Party pooper," James muttered as he closed his eyes. He was just starting to realize how exhausted he was. It had been awhile since he had gotten any sleep and he was hoping that he could catch a quick nap while Jackie did the whole portal thing.

Unfortunately, no such luck was had. About three minutes later, the car jerked so violently that it almost spun around and it woke him right the hell back up. "What the fuck?" he said as he looked around. They were no longer on the stretch of road that they had been on before. There didn't even seem to be a road anymore. All there was was this weird purple and black mist and this really strong wind that was threatening to overturn the entire van. "I thought that this was supposed to be better than teleporting!" he said angrily.

"Uh....I think something's not right today," Christina said nervously.

"You think?" Andy repeated incredulously. "In case you haven't noticed, this fucking--"

Something smashed into the side of the van so hard that all the windows on that side broke and the back door was dented inwards. Before anyone could find out what the fuck had hit them, they were getting hit from all directions. Broken glass was going everywhere and a whole bunch of tentacles slid in through the windows and attempted to grab all of them. The wind that had been blowing was even harder than James thought it would be, and he found it impossible to even keep his eyes open and see what the fuck was going on around him. Despite being virtually deaf and blind though, he grabbed what felt like a tentacle and tried to stab it. If he was going to die in this fucked up mess of a situation, he wasn't going out without a fight.

Suddenly the van was falling and it landed seconds later right in the middle of the park. The tentacle James had been stabbing was gone and he almost stabbed himself before he realized that. Very hesitantly, he opened his eyes. All that was left of the van were the seats, the very front of it and the bottom of it. The rest had been ripped off by whatever had attacked them. "Holy shit," he muttered. "Let's not ever do that again."

"I agree," Mark muttered. His right eye was swelling shut and he had a long cut along the left side of his face.

Jackie took off her seatbelt and started to turn around. "Is everyone...oh no."

James quickly took off his seatbelt and looked around. It didn't take him long to see why she had said that. Christina, Shannon, Shane and Matt were nowhere to be found. _That's definitely not good. That's not good at all._


	11. Chapter 11

Caedes looked down at his beaten and battered body. He was sore as hell, but he was healing very quickly. All he had to do was wait just a little longer and then he could get back in the game and be at one hundred percent. _I'm going to have to do something to get Jackie out of the way,_ he thought to himself as he stared up at the sky. _She's the strongest one out of all of them and the only one that can keep Jeff out of my clutches. Once she's gone, then Jeff is as good as mine._

He heard footsteps behind him so he turned around to see who it was. It was one of the demons that worked for him, although he couldn't remember the thing's name or even what kind of demon it was to save his life. "What?" he said, unhappy that he was being disturbed.

The demon, a pathetic looking thing that was only four feet tall and had pink skin, wringed his hands together nervously. "M-m-m-master we know where the humans have taken your pet," he stammered out.

Caedes rolled his eyes. "So do I you idiot. Do you really think it was hard for me to figure out where his new friends are taking him? They took him home, which is not good for us because it's their playing field." He shook his head. "It doesn't matter though. I'm not afraid to go to Apocalypse City."

The pink demon gulped loudly. "Good for you," he said under his breath.

"What was that now?" Caedes asked, even though he had heard the demon perfectly.

The other demon gulped again. "Well...I've been to Apocalypse City and I know from experience that it isn't even a good place for demons to be. We go there, and we're going to have more to worry about than just--"

Caedes had heard quite enough of that kind of negative talk, and snapped the pink demon's neck without hesitation. He knew very well what problems that could be awaiting them in Apocalypse City. The place was a breeding ground for chaos and destruction, and he was sure he still had more than his share of enimies from the last time he had been there. But those things didn't matter to him. What mattered was getting his hands on Jeff again. The world was soon going to be trembling at his feet and he wanted Jeff by his side. No human had ever caught his attention like this before. For as long as he could remember, he had seen human as cattles, just there to be killed for his own amusement. The fact that he couldn't get Jeff out of his head no matter how hard he tried both frustrated and intrigued him. He needed to get his hands on Jeff again and figure out what kind of spell the man had on him. And he was going to do just that, even if he had to destroy the entire world to do it.

.....

Jeff's chest felt like there was something extremely heavy sitting right in the middle of his chest, filling him with dread and making it hard for him to breathe. Matt, Shannon and Shane were missing. Sure he felt bad that Christina was gone too, but Matt was his brother and Shane and Shannon were his friends. He couldn't help being more worried about them. If they never found them or if they all died...he didn't know what he would do. The loss of his father was weighing heavily on him, but he had a feeling that it was going to get a lost worst once he actually had time to absorb what had happened to his father.

"Well this sucks," Mark grumbled. He put his hands on his hips and stared at the ruined remains of the van like it was going to give him some sort of clue as to where the others had gone. "Is there any upside to this situation at all?"

"Uh....we did end up in Apocalypse City," Andy said hesitantly when nobody else spoke up. "So this would have been perfect if the others hadn't disappeared on us."

Cooper sighed. "So how exactly are we supposed to get the others back?" he asked. "Fuck, how are we supposed to figure out where they went? I'm still trying to figure out what the fuck happened back there!"

"We'll figure it out somewhere else," Jackie said. As soon as she had realized that Christina was missing, her entire demeanor had changed. She was extremely tense and there was definitely more than a little bit of fear in her eyes.

"You guys still live in the hotel?" Chris asked.

"Yeah," Jackie replied, not even looking at Chris as she answered. "So let's move it people."

James gave her a nasty look. The whole getting bossed around thing by someone who wasn't Mark looked like it was starting to get on his nerves. "Okay, who died and put you in charge? Seriously, I--"

Jackie suddenly grabbed him by the throat and gave him a good throttle. Her eyes were turning black and something weird was going on with her face. It looked like there were a bunch of very thin black worms swimming all around beneath her skin. Jeff gasped and looked at Chris, who was staring at his niece with wide eyes. He obviously was as taken aback by this as Jeff was.

"You listen to me right now," Jackie growled, effortlessly keeping James still even though he was trying to get out of her grip. "If you have such an issue with me barking out orders, then you take it up with me after I get my sister back. Anything you say before that will not only not get listened to, but it could be the final thing you fucking say." She shoved James to Mark and stormed off.

James coughed violently while rubbing his throat. "Bitch is strong," he said, his voice hoarse and strained from the throttling that had just taken place.

Mark moved James's hands out of the way so he could look at the bruises that were already forming. "Jesus fucking Christ," he muttered.

Andy chuckled nervously. "Sorry about her," he said, kind of hiding behind Chris in case Mark or James came at him for what Jackie had just did. "She's just freaking out because of Christina. We've uh...lost a lot of people we've loved and she just gets really antsy when something like this happens."

James rolled his eyes and muttered a whole bunch of obscenities under his breath. Jeff didn't hear everything that was said, but the words "fucking cunt" were clearly audible. _Mark better keep him in line,_ he thought to himself as they all followed Andy (who was trying to tell Jackie to wait up for a second so they could all catch up with her). _Jackie didn't sound like she was kidding._

Chris wrapped his arm around Jeff and pulled him closer to him. "Stay close to me," Chris ordered in a low voice. "This place isn't really that safe to be in."

Jeff gave his boyfriend a serious look. "On a scale of one to ten, how bad is it?"

"Uh...we would be safer walking across a land mine," Chris admitted.

Mor overheard that and he glared at Jericho. "If that was the case, why didn't you speak the fuck up before we got here? I might still have Matt with me if you had just--"

"Jackie and Andy know what they're doing," Chris interrupted. "And so does Christina. They've been doing this whole fighting evil gig since they were kids. Believe me, I wouldn't be trusting them with helping to protect Jeff if I didn't know that they know what they're doing."

Mor bit his lower lip. "What about Matt?" he asked hesitantly. "Are they gonna be able to get him back?"

Chris nodded. "Yeah. We'll get everyone back and then we'll Caedes and then we'll be done with this bullshit."

Jeff couldn't tell whether Chris was just saying that to make Mor feel better or if he really believed that. Jeff wanted to believe it, but it was a hard thing to do when his mind drifted back to the memory of his rape. He shuddered and tried to push it back out of his mind. He couldn't think about that and stay sane. _I have to believe what Chris is saying,_ he told himself. _I have to believe that somehow we're going to keep Caedes from hurting me again._

Jackie finally slowed down enough so they could start walking along side her, and they soon came to a street filled with wrecked cars and demon bodies laying every which way. The demons were all different shapes and sizes, and Jeff was amazed that they had just been left lying there for everyone to see.

"The human bodies usually get cleaned up first," Andy explained once he saw the look on Jeff's face. "Someone will clean all these up later."

"Where the fuck do you dump these things?" Mark asked while keeping a watchful eye on James. The look on the psycho's face suggested that he was possibly plotting something bad.

"We usually burn them," Jackie answered. "It stinks like shit but it's better than burying them." She shoved her hands inside her pockets. "That's why I appreciate vampries so much more. They turn right to dust when you drive a sharp pointy stake right in their heart. All you gotta do is brush the ashes off if they get on your clothes."

"Do vampires sparkle like that one movie says they does?" Connor asked as Cooper tried to keep him from wandering off. Jeff had a strong suspicion that Connor wanted to start poking all the demon carcasses for his own entertainment.

Jackie snorted. "Hell no. If vampires are exposed to the sun longer than a couple of seconds, they catch on fire. That bitch who wrote those stupid Twilight books is way off base."

"Oh." It was hard to tell whether Connor was disappointed by that or not. "Well--oooh! There's a puppy!" He tried to run over and grab it but Cooper pulled him back. "Coopy what are you doing?" he asked, desperately trying to get free. "I want the puppy!"

"Connor look at that thing!" Cooper snapped. "That ain't no dog!"

"It is too!" Connor insisted stubbornly. "Look at it! It's all lonely over there!"

Jeff took a good look at the "puppy" in question. It did like a puppy until you saw its face. There was absolutely nothing puppy like about its face at all. The thing had a face of a demon. "Jackie? What is that?" he asked.

"A baby hell hound," Jackie answered. "From the looks of it, I say it's a week old at the most."

"Can I have it Daddy?" Connor asked eagerly. He began jumping up and down excitedly. "Please please please please please with cherry and naked Marky on top?"

James chuckled while Mark looked at Jackie. "Is that thing going to kill us?" he asked.

Jackie sighed impatiently. "Well it's a baby, so you might be able to train it...but if it's already tasted human flesh it could try to rip your throat out as soon as you go to pet it."

"Well fuck that shit then," James said loudly. He grabbed Connor by one arm while Cooper grabbed the other and they forcibly marched the younger man away. Connor protested loudly but everyone ignored him. Jeff looked back at the baby hell hound and saw that it was staring at them with its head tilted to the side. It almost appeared to be puzzled about why they were just walking away from it. _Aw, it's cute...in a weird ugly kind of way anyway._

"How much further till we get where we're going?" Cooper asked. "There's only so much longer that we're going to be able to hold him."

Connor whined and tried to twist himself free. He still wanted the baby hell hound.

"It's uh...another two miles," Andy confessed.

Cooper glared at him. "Please tell me you're joking."

Andy shook his head. "Sorry, I wish I was."

Jeff looked at the roads. The further they walked, the more of a mess the roads became. Even if they got their hands on a car, they wouldn't be able to drive anywhere. "What happened here?" he asked. "It looks like a tornado hit this place."

"Well things had just gotten done being crazy when we left here, so shit probably hit the fan again while we were gone," Jackie said with a sigh. She took her cell phone out of her pocket and flipped it open. After taking one look at it she frowned. "I've got no reception," she announced. "Andy?"

Andy took his own phone and looked at it. "Fuck, I don't have any either." He looked at everyone else. "What about you guys?"

They all took their phones and found that they didn't have any reception either. Jeff looked at Chris, who just shrugged. He didn't know why that had happened. "This is never a good sign," Jackie muttered unhappily as they started walking faster than they were before. "I swear, if it's not one thing it's an--" She was cut off by a high pitched scream that sounded like it was coming from a little girl. Without hesitation she ran off in that direction, forcing the others to sprint after her just to keep up. The screams were coming from a nearby alley, and when they got there they saw a little girl being chased by what almost looked like a gargoyle. "Daddy!" the terrified child shrieked. "DADDY!"

Jackie started to lunge for the gargoyle, but all of a sudden it dropped down to the ground and just stayed there. There was a large arrow sticking out of its back now, and it looked like it had struck the gargoyle right in the heart. Standing not too far from the thing was a bald, middle aged man holding a crossbow.

"Rupes!" Jackie exclaimed. "You took my fun away!"

Rupes just shrugged. "Sorry kiddo, but that was my kill."

Jackie pouted. "Bitch. I no like you now."

The little girl that had been getting chased stopped running and stared at everyone with wide, terrified eyes. She couldn't have been any older than five or six years old. "Daddy," she whimpered, backing up against the wall. Her face and eyes were red from crying.

Jeff approached the distressed little girl slowly. He flinched as she immediately screamed and hid behind the dumpster that was near her. "Hey, hold on for a second. I'm not going to hurt you."

She just continued to cry and act like she hadn't heard him.

"Her dad's dead," Rupes said quietly, making Jeff look back at him. "I'm pretty sure she saw it...I want to say it was this fucking gargoyle that did it, but I only found it chasing her so I can't say for sure." He frowned. "Where's Christina?"

"Well uh...she kind of got lost in the portal we took to get here," Jackie said, wincing at the look that came over Rupes's face.

"Oh Jackie," Rupes groaned. "No no no, tell me you're joking."

"It was Christina's idea!" Jackie said defensively, pulling Andy in front of her so she could use him as a human shield. "And nobody called to tell us that we couldn't travel by portal!"

Andy sighed. "Why are you using me as a shield? This should be the other way around. You're the stronger one!"

"Yeah, but you're my big brother! That means you're automatically the shield!"

"Who is this Rupes guy anyway?" Mor asked Chris.

"Their legal guardian," Chris answered. He took a step forward. "You look like you've been put through the wringer Rupes. Robin and Damien haven't been aruging again, have they?"

Rupes almost smiled. "They have, but that's not what my problem is."

"So what exactly is the problem?" Andy asked, now looking apprehensive.

"Well...I'm hoping that all the signs are wrong, but if they're not, then we've got about forty eight hours before every other dimension in this universe starts trying to bleed into this one."

"Uh...so does that mean the world is having their period and we are its tampon?" James asked.

Mark smacked him on the side of the head. "Lawson!"

"What? It was a legitimate quesion!"

Rupes shook his head. "No, we are not a tampon. That would be better. No, once again, I am the man that cried apocalypse nowish...Caedes isn't even our biggest problem anymore. The demons are talking and they're scared. This is bigger than Caedes. Whatever woke him up, is not just looking to destroy our world; they want to destroy _every_ dimension there is."

Jeff winced. He didn't like the sound of that at all. _And just when I thought this could not get any fucking worse._


	12. Chapter 12

Matt had absolutely no idea where he was. One moment he had been in the car and the next he had been violently thrown out of it by what had looked like a fifty foot tall octopus. The damn thing was gone now, but that didn't mean he, Shannon, Shane and Christina were any safer. In fact, they were probably in even more danger because none of them knew where they were.

"What the fuck is this place?" Shannon asked. He was clutching the upper part of his left arm in an effort to stop the blood that was pouring out of it. He had gotten cut up pretty badly; the blood had already soaked that sleeve of his shirt.

"I don't know for sure," Christina replied. She was trying to force herself to put some weight on her right ankle, which had gotten injured in the midst of all the chaos. "But I think we're in another dimension."

"Wonderful," Shane muttered. He took off his shirt and tied it around Shannon's arm as tightly as he could in an effort to get the bleeding to stop. "That's great. Where are the others then?"

"I don't know!" Christina almost looked to be near tears, but Matt couldn't tell whether it was because she was scared or because of the pain she was in. "They could have made it to Apocalypse City for all I know." She tried to start walking on her injured ankle and almost immediately fell over. Matt quickly sprang into action and managed to catch her before she hit the ground. "Easy now," he said quietly. "You're going to hurt yourself more if you push yourself too hard.

She shook her head. "I'll be fine," she said in a strained voice. "I've been hurt worse than this."

Matt didn't doubt that, but that wasn't the point. He started to point that out to her, but the look she gave him shut up. She didn't want to hear it. He sighed and looked around at their surroundings. The sky was blood red and heavy gray clouds were scattered all over the place above them. There were a few trees but the wood was black and more than likely rotten. The ground below them was all rock and it was unbearably hot. It had to be at least a hundred degrees in this place and it seemed to be getting hotter each and every second.

"Do you think we should just stay here in case the others try and rescue us?" Shane asked. "Or do you think we should walk around and try to find a way out of here?"

Matt shrugged. He had no idea how to answer that. "What do you think?" he asked Christina.

She bit her lip. "I don't think standing here is a good idea," she said after thinking about if for a moment. "We're too exposed."

"So we move then," Matt concluded. "Okay, so we kind of--" He stopped talking as he felt the ground start to shake. At first it was a very weak tremor but it quickly got so strong that it almost took them all off of their feet. "What the fuck is going on?"

"It's a fucking earthquake!" Shannon exclaimed.

"Uh…I don't think so," Shane said nervously. He pointed to something off at the distance. Matt almost refused to turn around and look at it. He had a bad feeling that he wasn't going to like what he saw if he did so. Despite his trepidation though, he turned around and looked. As it turned out, his instincts had been right. He didn't like what he was seeing at all. There was a giant stampede of demons coming straight at them.

"Run!" Christina screamed.

Matt didn't need to be told that twice. He quickly threw Christina over his shoulder and took off after Shane and Shannon. The jagged rocks that were all over the place made it extremely hard to run, and the mini-earthquake the stampeding demons were only making it worse. But somehow they managed to make it one of the trees that were nearby. Shannon and Shane climbed up it first and then Matt handed Christina up to Shane so he could climb up there too. Just as he got out of the way, the stampede came charging through right by them. The demons had human like torsos and arms, but their heads and legs looked more like they had come from an elephant. None of them looked up as they went by, which was something that Matt was extremely grateful for. He had no idea what they would have done if the demons had noticed them.

"That was way too close," Shane said as he let out a sigh of relief.

Christina nodded. "It really was. I--wait, does anyone hear that cracking sound?"

Matt was about to ask what cracking sound, but he was interrupted by the tree splitting them in half and sending them all crashing to the ground. "Oh fuck," he muttered, looking at his arm that had gotten cut by a sharp rock. "That sucked."

"At least the thing didn't break any sooner than that," Shannon muttered. He got back up to his feet and then helped Christina up.

Christina winced and just stood on her good foot. It looked like she might have jarred her injured ankle yet again. "Come on," she said. "Let's go see if there's somewhere we can go hide out until we figure out what the fuck to do next."

Matt had no objections to that plan. If hiding meant avoiding more demons, he was all for it. He couldn't take too much more of this bullshit.

…..

With everything that had been happening lately, James had seriously thought that he had seen it all. He really had. But now he and the others were sitting in Razor's Italian Villa and they were being served a shit load of food by an orange demon that had bright red hair, a humongous under bite that exposed his bottom two fangs and nine inch fingernails that were sharp as…well razors, obviously. But what disturbed James the most about this whole situation was the fact that the food looked and smelled really good. _Domesticated demons…who knew?_

"So how exactly is this going to help us find the others?" John asked as Jackie shoveled a whole bunch of spaghetti into her mouth.

"Eating helps her strength, which is something she's gonna need for this spell," Rupes explained. "The thing is, if you take a portal to somewhere within your own dimension, it's separate from the portals that go from dimension to dimension. But because of everything that is going on, it's causing complete and total chaos, so all the portals are bleeding together and there's no telling where someone will end up if they go through one."

"Do you think the others ended up somewhere all together?" Cooper asked, digging into the food that he had been served.

"Hopefully they did," Razor said as he set a basket of bread sticks down on the table. "If they're together then that means we should get them back all at once and we can end the spell a hell of a lot quicker."

James grabbed a breadstick and bit into it. "What the fuck is the deal with this spell anyway?"

Andy shook his head. "Jackie did it once before. You see, when she was seven, a friend of hers got sucked through a portal and was trapped in a hell dimension for six years. Jackie got him out by opening the gates to every dimension in existence and pulling him out."

Mark, who had been about to take a bite of his food, paused and looked at Jackie. "You did that?"

Jackie nodded. "My demon side had just fully woken up and gave me this big old power rush. I was lucky I didn't get myself killed though." She looked over at Jeff, who was holding the little girl Rupes had saved on his lap. "You getting anything out of her?"

Jeff shook his head. "She still won't talk to me."

Chris sighed. "What are we going to do about her?" he asked. "I mean, how are we going to find out if she has any family or not?"

James shook his head. He felt bad for the little girl; he really did. But if the world was going to end like Rupes had said it was going to earlier, then they needed to deal with that issue first. "You said that whatever woke Caedes up wants to kill everyone in every dimension. How the hell do you know that?"

Rupes swallowed the mouthful of food he was chewing. "A demon coming back to life doesn't cause the shit that's been going on all across the fucking universe. Caedes was and is powerful, but this is too much to be just him."

"And if demons come back to life, they're supposed to come back to life at the place they died at," Razor added. "Caedes died here in Apocalypse City, not in North Carolina."

"So whatever brought him back did something to make sure he resurrected somewhere else," Andy said, getting with the program. "And that created enough of a glitch in the system to allow the big cheese to take advantage of the situation and cause more chaos."

"That's what I think," Rupes confirmed. "Add in the fact that the kind of hell demons like Caedes go to are impossible to get out of without some serious help and that just makes me believe he's a pawn in this whole thing."

James sighed. Now he had a headache. "So we have to get the others back, kill Caedes, find who woke him up in the first place and kill them too? Fuck, that is a lot of fucking bullshit to go through."

Jackie smirked. "Welcome to our world. It's--Connor!"

James looked over at Connor just in time to see his youngest boy doing the seizure thing it did every time he had a vision now. "That's it!" James roared as he jumped out of his seat and rushed to Connor's side "I'm fucking beyond sick of these things. They fucking--"

Connor's eyes rolled back to the way they were supposed to be and he let out a loud gasp. He stared up at the ceiling in horror before letting out one single word.

"Mommy!"


	13. Chapter 13

"Home sweet hell," Caedes said under his breath as he officially arrived at Apocalypse City. He had been born here hundreds and hundreds of years ago, but back then, it had been ruled by demons instead of humans. Then the plague known as humanity had struck and the majority of the ancient demons had either died or were cast out to other dimension. Caedes himself had actually been banished after the plague started, but after three hundred years in another demon dimension, he had managed to find his way back and he had gotten to work on building his army so he could wipe humanity off the face of the planet. Unfortunately, his efforts the first time around had been thwarted by him getting killed by Shirley Ferguson and her little merry band of flunkies had not only managed to thwart his efforts, but they killed him in the process.

But that didn't matter anymore. He was alive (although the reason for that was actually unknown for him) and his heart was no longer inside of his body, which helped prevented him from being killed. Once a demon was resurrected, his life was in his heart and it needed to be completely destroyed before he could die for good. _I won't let that happen though. Being dead is very unpleasant and inconvenient. I don't ever want to have to deal with that ever again._

"Master," one of his followers said. "I smell the Hardy bitch you want."

Caedes smirked. "Yes. I smell him too. He's close."

"Oh my God, are you serious?"

"Now now my dear, settle down. Jeff is a cute little thing. I don't blame Caedes for wanting him."

Caedes looked over and saw Balthazar and some dead woman standing next to him. He growled. Balthazar was not only a demon, but he also ruled over one of the worst demon dimensions in existence. Back in the old days, almost all the demons had hated and feared him. His appetite for destruction was almost unmatched and his sadistic nature knew no bounds. It had taken ten very powerful sorcerers to banish him out of this dimension, and eight of those men had died in the process. But with their banishing, they had seemingly found a way to keep him from ever coming back into his dimension.

Until now anyway.

"Surprised to see me?" Balthazar asked with a smirk. "And don't say you're not because I know that's a lie."

"Oh you do, do you?" Caedes asked, slightly annoyed. He had never liked Balthazar and he wasn't about to start doing so now. He had never forgotten about the time dear old Balty had attempted to eviscerate him for the fun of it. "Well good for you. I'm very happy for you. Now if you'll excuse me--"

"Oh you're going to go already?" Balthazar asked in mock surprise. He looked at his female companion. "I told you he was terribly rude. We should have used someone who had better manners."

The woman only shook her head. "Manners are overrated. Besides, he was useful, wasn't he?"

"What are they talking about Master?" one of the other demons whispered to Caedes.

Balthazar heard that and began to laugh hysterically. "Master?" he said incredulously. "They actually call you master?" He doubled over and slapped his scabby, flesh colored leg. "Good grief Caedes, I don't know who you're trying to kid. Anyone with half a brain knows that you aren't smart enough to be the master of anything." He looked at Caedes's army disdainfully. "Now I admit, you've got an impressive number of followers here. But who's to say that they wouldn't turn against you the first chance they got."

"Me," Caedes replied. "You see, unlike you, I have followers that actually want to follow me. They don't do it out of fear like all of your followers have always done."

Balthazar chuckled. "You're only saying that because you don't know how to scare anyone but humans properly. Believe me, if you were me, you would be singing a different tune." He slipped away from the woman with him and began circling Caedes. Caedes made sure never to let his back be to Balthazar for one single second. That would be a mistake of epic proportions.

"Aren't you curious about how you came back exactly?" Balthazar asked. "I mean, you did get yourself killed pretty nicely there."

Caedes shrugged. "If I am, would I really tell you?"

"You should since I'm the one who orchestrated your entire storybook comeback.

That threw Caedes completely off guard, which just made Balthazar laugh. "Yeah, it was me," Balthazar confessed. "You see Caedes, I couldn't come back on my own. I needed something to throw this entire universe completely out of whack. That something turned out to be you and well…now that you've done your job…it's time to find a new use for you."

Caedes didn't like the sound of that. He went to tell his army to start attacking, but then he noticed for the first time that they were completely frozen. They didn't even appear to be breathing. Before he could even begin to comprehend what that was all about, he felt something similar to an electrical bolt hit him in the back, not only paralyzing him, but lifting him up in the air.

"Now this is my kind of toy," the woman said happily. She walked around to Caedes's line of view, making it clear that she was pointing something at him. It almost looked like a wand but it was too big in diameter to be one and it had some sort of strange carving on it that traditional wands just didn't have.

"I'm glad you like it," Balthazar said with a smile. He seemed genuinely infatuated with this woman, which was just hard for Caedes to believe. Balthazar was the type of demon to torture anyone and anything at a moment's notice. "Now Caedes," dear old Balty said in a very professional voice. "Listen here. I could kill you right now, but I won't. Despite your utter stupidity and unwarranted arrogance, you and your little army will fit nicely right into my own little army. And--if you're a good boy--I might even let you get your precious Jeff."

Caedes scowled because that was the only thing he could do. He still couldn't move to save his own life and he could feel whatever mojo that was working against him pressing up against his brain. He didn't even have his free will anymore. He was a puppet caught in Balthazar's trap, and he didn't see anyway out of it any time soon.

…

Chris sighed impatiently as he only half listened to the little argument that was going on between the three Lawsons and Mark. Connor was insisting that Annabelle's spirit was somehow in trouble, James was getting angry because nobody could explain _how_ that was possible, Cooper was on Connor's side in wanting to check it out and Mark was opposed to it because he said something didn't feel right about it. Chris sympathized with the situation; he really did. But Matt, Christina, Shannon and Shane needed saving and unlike Annabelle, they weren't already dead (at least he hoped they weren't).

"Okay, this is getting ridiculous," Razor finally said. "We don't even have time for this." He looked at Rupes. "Why don't you and I stay here and figure out the ghost girl situation and the others go back to the hotel and save Christina and them and maybe get us some reinforcements that we can use when the apocalypse really fucking starts."

Rupes nodded and looked at Jackie. She merely held out her hand. "Keys?"

"You wish," Rupes said. He tossed the keys to Andy instead. "Now get gone."

"Kylie," the little girl said suddenly, making everyone look at her. She didn't look back at them though. She was too busy talking to Jeff.

"That's a pretty name," Jeff said as he stood up. He already had her in his arms and he began following Jackie and Andy out the front door.

"I know," Kylie said innocently.

Chris chuckled as he and Mor followed the others out of the restaurant and into Rupes's car. _At least the kid's calmed down now. Non-hysterical children should make this a little easier._

"I don't see why Rupes couldn't let me drive," Jackie pouted. "I'm a good driver."

Andy snorted. "No you are not. You're one of the worst drivers in the history of driving."

"Obviously you've never been in a car with James behind the wheel," Mor muttered under his breath.

Kylie looked back and forth between all of them before speaking up. "Are we all going to die cuz of this?" she asked suddenly.

Chris looked at her, completely startled by that question. "No," he said. "Of course not."

Kylie stared at him for a second before shaking her head. She didn't believe him. "Jackie?"

Jackie sighed and looked back at her. "We might," she said honestly. She saw the look that Jeff gave her when she said that and that made her shake her head. "What do you want me to say? You want me to lie?"

"She's a little girl," Jeff objected. "You can't tell her things like that."

Jackie shook her head and turned back around. Chris sighed and rubbed his face tiredly. He knew that being brutally honest was just Jackie's nature. Given the way she had lived though, he didn't blame her. Her demon sperm donor had not only murdered her parents in front of her when she was seven, but he attempted to gut her like a catfish while he was at it. She was never the same after that, and getting into the war of good vs. evil after Rupes nearly died when she was nine probably made it worse. He wished he could have taken her and her siblings in after Brandon and Sarah had died; if he had, they would probably not only be less damaged but their brother Zach might still be alive.

"So," Andy said, trying to break up the uncomfortable silence. "After we work the mojo and get the others back, does anyone want to have ice cream?"

Mor raised his eyebrows. "You're thinking about ice cream at a time like this?"

"Yeah," Andy replied. "If I've learned one thing in all my years of demon hunting, it's this: enjoy the little things. Because soon enough, you'll get horribly ripped to shreds by a demon and then you won't be able to enjoy anything."

Chris blinked. That was a good philosophy….sure it was graphic and horribly morbid, but it was good nonetheless.

…

"I still don't think this is a good idea," Mark said under his breath. He twirled the battle axe he had been given around in his hands as they walked through the cemetery Connor had claimed that he had seen Annabelle at. "Come on, does this not smell fishy to you?"

James glared at his lover. "It's Annabelle," he said angrily. "Why would Connor lie about seeing her in trouble?"

Mark just sighed. He didn't even bother answering that. James sighed too and looked up ahead at the others. Connor had stopped in front of a crypt and was pointing at it. "That one," he said. "She's in there."

"You sure?" Cooper asked.

Connor nodded.

"Okay, out of the way," Rupes said. He raised his foot up and kicked open the crypt door. He, Cooper and Connor rushed in there. "Mom!" the boys shouted at the same time.

That was all James needed to hear. He abandoned Mark and Razor in favor of running into the crypt. He skidded to a stop when he saw Annabelle sitting in the middle of the crypt, trapped there by some sort of green looking force field. "Annabelle!" He didn't know how this was possible, and he really didn't care at the moment.

Annabelle shook her head. "No no no no no no no. Run. James run!"

"Annabelle--"

"It's a trap!"

The crypt door slammed shut as soon as those words left her mouth. They all whirled around and saw the person who had shut the door. James felt all the blood drain out of his face. _No fucking way. No no no it's not her. Shit shit shit…_

"What's wrong James?" Caroline asked with an evil smile. "Aren't you happy to see me?"


	14. Chapter 14

The Applegate Hotel not only looked haunted, but it was so run down that Jeff was shocked that the place was collapsing on top of them right at that moment. "You guys actually live here?" he asked in disbelief.

Jackie shook her head as she poured some red sand around her in a circle going counter clockwise. "Don't worry, it's not going to fall on us. It just looks like it will."

"I never said--"

"You were thinking it."

"How do you know?"

"Because you had the same look on your face that Chris always used to get whenever he came to visit when I was a kid."

Chris grinned sheepishly. "Well can you blame me? I mean, I thought Brandon and Sarah were insane for moving you kids in here. Shit, this place should have been torn down years ago."

Mor, who was sitting on the receptionist desk and trying to act like he wasn't snooping through the papers that were next to him. "Why do you guys live in a hotel anyway?" he asked. "I mean, why isn't this place open for business?"

Andy slapped John's hand to make him stop with the snooping before he answered that question. "It closed like twenty five years ago or so because a bunch of hell hounds got in and slaughtered every guest in this place. It was actually supposed to get torn down, but our dad fixed this place up and got permission to move us in here."

"Why?"

He shrugged. "Hell if I know. Neither Mom or Dad were known for making the best or sanest decisions while they were alive."

"You can say that again," Jackie muttered. She sat down in a cross legged position and looked at Andy. "Dagger."

Andy sighed and handed one over to her. Once she had it in her hand, she used it cut her own arm open, which made Jeff wince and Kylie gasp. "Doesn't that hurt?" the child asked innocently.

Jackie just shrugged. "I've felt worse." She stretched her bleeding arm out in front of her. "You all might want to get back. This might get crazy."

"Are you sure this is even going to work?" Jeff asked as he nervously backed away from her.

"It should…of course at this point, I wouldn't be surprised if it doesn't." She took a deep breath and began chanting under her breath. "Patefacio porta, effrego obex quod ostendo sum usque universitias volo. Addo meus amicitia tergum volo." She kept chanting this over and over again, and at first, Jeff not only had no idea what the fuck she was saying, but he also thought that it wasn't working. But then he started hearing this really weird crackling noise. "What the hell is that?" he asked.

Chris shook his head. "I don't know. It almost sounds like fireworks though."

Kylie pointed towards the front door. "Look!" she said while making sure to stay hidden behind Jeff. "There's lightning up there!"

Jeff, Chris, John and Andy looked up to see what she was talking about. For a moment, it almost did look like there was some sort of weird lightning storm going on in front of them. But then it started becoming apparent that the lightning wasn't actually lightning at all. It was all the gateways to the other worlds Jackie was opening up. "Holy shit," Jeff muttered. He could sense that it would probably be in his best interest to get even further back, but his feet felt like they were rooted to the spot.

"Yeah, it's pretty amazing," Andy muttered.

"How in the hell is she even doing this?" John asked in a hushed voice. "I mean, this is just--"

"Unbelievable?" Andy finished. He grabbed Kylie and started backing away even more. "Yeah um…it's the demon blood she has in her. It's why she had to cut herself open. If she doesn't use it as a catalyst, this wouldn't work. Believe me, she's found that out the hard---uh oh, here we go."

The gateways, which had been opening at a very slow rate up until now, suddenly all burst open at once, causing effects that felt similar to a bomb going off. Jeff and the others all went flying back because of the blast and then he couldn't see anything because of a blinding white light that filled the entire lobby. He immediately closed his eyes and put his hands over him, but even that couldn't block it out. The light pounded into his head, shooting bullets into his temple and making his brain feel like it was going to explode. He tried to scream, but there was a roaring sound in his ears that made it impossible for him to tell whether he was actually doing it or not.

Suddenly he heard a scream through the roaring, white abyss and then everything went still and silent. He slowly uncovered his eyes and opened them back up. It took him several minutes to actually be able to see again. When he was able to though, he saw that Jackie was slumped over and Matt, Shannon, Shane and Christina were back. "Matty," he said happily, trying to get back up to his feet so he could greet his brother but getting back knocked down by an overexcited John before he could get all the way up.

Matt grunted as John practically jumped on him. "Hey baby," he said.

John gave Matt a big kiss. "Are you okay?"

"Oh we're just fine," Shannon said sarcastically before Matt could reply. "We got to run from stampedes and hide like wusses the entire time we were in Demon World."

"Hey, at least they got us back here," Shane said as he and Andy knelt down to check on Jackie. "Is she going to be okay?" he asked.

"I'm fine," Jackie said weakly. It looked and sounded like that spell had taken a lot out of her. "Just give me…a little bit. I'll be…good as new."

Andy carefully scooped Jackie into his arms and stood back up. "I'm going to take her upstairs so she can sleep this off," he said. "Then we should go find---Christina what's wrong?"

Christina began whimpering and clutching at her head. "Vision," she whimpered. "Shady Hill cemetery…the others are in trouble…" Her voice trailed off and her mouth dropped in horror. "I see death…"

"Oh fucking hell," Andy cursed. He set Jackie down on the couch. "You stay here." He pointed to Chris, Kylie and Jeff. "You guys make sure she actually stays here. She's not going to be any good to anyone the way she is now. And the rest of you…well you can come with me if you want." He grabbed a couple weapons and started heading out the door. Christina immediately followed him and after a short discussion, Shannon and Shane decided to go too. Matt tried to go, but John pulled him back. "Matt please, just stay here," he pleaded. "I thought I lost you once already. I can't do that again."

"But the others--"

"Mark and James are there! What the hell could possibly happen with them around?"

…

"James!" Mark yelled as he tried to break down the crypt door. It was refusing to budge an inch, which was really pissing him off. He had seen Caroline's ghost or zombie or whatever the fuck she was now go in there and he knew that this shit was about as bad as it could get. "JAMES!"

"Stand back!" Razor ordered.

"Why?"

"Just do it!"

Mark went to glare at the demon but then caught on to what the plan was when he saw the ax raised in the air. He got out of the way so Razor could try to use it to break the door open. As soon as the blade hit the door, it bounced off and didn't even leave a dent in it. "Shit," Razor muttered. "That's not a good sign."

"What the fuck is going on?" Mark asked, completely and utterly frustrated at this point.

"I don't know," Razor replied. "But this door isn't going to budge. We need to find another way in."

Mark wasn't sure as how the hell they were going to do that but he wasn't going to waste time arguing. He just needed to get in there before something really fucking bad happened to James or the boys. If he didn't…well he didn't really want to think about what could happen.

…

James stared at his long dead mother in shock. At first he thought this had to be a dream. There was no possible way that she could be there. He had not only killed her, but he had dismembered her and burned her body afterwards. She couldn't be back…but then she laughed and the reality of the situation began to set in. "How the…what the fuck--"

Caroline laughed. "Look at me. I'm good as new…well, except for the still being dead part. I wasn't allowed to technically be alive again. But it's okay. Balty fixed me right up." She took her eyes off of James long enough to glare at Rupes. "Put down that sword you moron. It's not going to do you any good." She put one eye back on James and then looked at the others. "You're all dead…you just don't know it yet."

"Daddy I don't like her," Connor whispered. "Make her go away."

That just made Caroline laugh. "Oh my God, that is pathetic." She shook her head at James. "What have you been doing with your children James?"

"Being a better parent that you ever were," James growled. He tried to grab her by the throat so he could snap her neck, but his hand went right through her.

"I'm a ghost you retard," Caroline said with a roll of her eyes. "You can't kill me again." She suddenly turned to glare at Annabelle. "Who the hell said you could get up?"

Annabelle froze. "Mom please, you don't have to do this. Just let them go and--"

"Yeah, you're boring me already," Caroline said with a sigh. "Let's just get this party started already."

James tried to do something (even though he had no idea what he _could_ do) but as soon as he moved, Caroline raised the weird stick thing she was holding and fired it at him. A red light hit him directly in the chest, taking him off his feet and sending him flying so hard that he went through the crypt wall and didn't stop until he crashed into a three about twenty feet away. The impact made it so he literally couldn't breathe and he was in such a daze that it took him several minutes to even get up on his hands and feet.

"DAD!"

"No no no no no!"

"JAMES!"

The combination of Cooper, Annabelle and Mark screaming his name made him push himself back on his feet. "Holy shit," he muttered. He started stumbling towards Mark, who was actually running full speed at him for the first time in years. "I don't know what that bitch hit me with but--" His voice died in his throat when Mark not only looked right through him, but _ran through him_ as well. He stopped moving immediately, trying to process what the hell had just happened. "No," he muttered. "No no no it can't--oh fuck me." He looked back and saw that Mark was kneeling down beside his lifeless body.

"Daddy!" Connor yelled. He, Cooper, Razor and Rupes were coming towards him now too. "Daddy!"

"Daddy Daddy!" Caroline screeched in her most mocking voice. "Your Daddy is dead you stupid of piece of shit! But don't worry love; you'll all be joining him soon."

James shook his head in disbelief. This was not happening. There was no way this was happening. He was not dead, and therefore, not a ghost nobody else seemed to be able to see.

"Oh and James?" Caroline said, obviously enjoying the fact that nobody could see him (or even hear her anymore…nobody looked up as she said his name). "Hell has been waiting for you for a long time…and it is done being patient."

"You fucking bitch, what have you--" James stopped and turned around as a low growling sound caught his attention. Standing behind him now were a bunch of demons wearing red hoods. _Oh fuck me…_


	15. Chapter 15

"James!" Mark yelled, losing track of how many times he had already said his lover's name. His throat was raw and his voice was just about gone but he didn't care. James was not breathing and despite doing CPR for what felt like forever, he wasn't getting any kind of response from the fallen man.

"Daddy!" Connor wailed, clinging on to Cooper and shaking his head in disbelief. "Daddy wake up! DADDY!"

"What the fuck happened in there?" Razor asked Rupes. They were standing back just a little bit, looking around for Caroline and Annabelle, who had both disappeared without warning.

"The ghost bitch hit him with a mojo stick," Rupes replied.

"What kind of mojo stick?"

"The bad kind damn it!" Rupes looked around wildly, looking ready to decapitate the next thing that came near him. "Look, I didn't get the greatest look at it, alright?"

Mark tuned out the rest of that conversation as he continued trying to get James to breathe again. "Lawson! God damn it!" He slapped James across the face, completely unwilling to accept the reality of the situation. "Wake up!"

Cooper shook his head. "Mark it's not working," he said. His voice was so strained that he didn't even sound like himself. "He's--"

"No! He is not dead!" Mark growled. "He's not…he's just…I don't know. But he's not dead!" It was denial in its purest form and he was not planning on letting it go if he could help it. He literally could not accept James being dead. It was just beyond what he was capable of doing.

"Dead or not, we need to get him and us the fuck out of here," Rupes said, barging in on the conversation. "We can't just stand here and wait for the crazy ghost bitch to come back and finish the rest of us off."

"That's assuming she's left," Razor said darkly. He was looking around the area suspiciously. "Something is still fucking here. I can feel it."

Mark growled and got back up to his feet. The thought of Caroline still being in the area made his blood boil. "Where is she?" he snarled, looking around and praying that she showed her face. He was so angry that the fact that she was just a ghost really wasn't registering in his mind at the moment. He just wanted to get his hands on her and rip her to shreds. "WHERE IS SHE?"

The sound of her cackling reached his ears and he whirled around quickly, still not seeing her at all. "Where are you?" he yelled, his whole body actually shaking from his rage. "CAROLINE!"

He felt something cold brush up against his arm, sending a very violent shiver up his spine. "You fucking bitch this isn't a game!" he snarled, actually shaking because he was so angry.

"It is a game though," she whispered, sounding like she was right up by his ear. "It's all a game in _hell_." She cackled again and then she was gone, making him even madder than he had been before.

"Bring him back," Cooper said suddenly, startling everyone around him. "Bring him back. There's got to be a way to do it. I mean for fuck's sake, look at all this bullshit that's been happening. You can't tell me someone around here can't do a fucking resurrection spell."

If Mark would have been over there, he would have kissed Cooper right at that moment. He hadn't even thought of that idea.

Razor leaned towards Rupes. "You said it was a mojo stick," he pointed out. "That means we've got a good shot at making it work."

Rupes nodded but he looked really apprehensive about the idea. "It's worth a shot," he said. "But--"

Mark didn't want to hear about the buts. He had heard enough to get him moving again. He walked back over to James's body and bent down to pick him up.

"Here let me--" Cooper started to say.

"I've got it," Mark said, not so easily scooping his lover up into his arms. He really did need help but he wasn't going to admit it. Today denial was his name and it was going to stay that way because he was going to break the fuck down if it didn't."

…

James backed away from the demons, even though it was becoming more and more obvious that there really was no point in doing that. He was not only completely and utterly surrounded, but he was cut off from Mark and the others. They couldn't see or hear him and now he couldn't even hear what they were saying despite still being able to see them. "Fuck fuck fuck," he muttered under his breath. "Shit cock sucking mother fucker--"

"Do you kiss me with that mouth?" Caroline asked. She was sitting up in a tree now, looking down at James with great amusement.

"Fuck you you stupid bitch!" he snarled.

She smirked. "Oh yes, mouth off to me honey. That's a smart thing to do."

He shook his head and looked around for Annabelle. "Put me back in my fucking body you stupid cunt, or I'm gonna--"

"You're going to what?" Caroline snarled, sneering cockily at him. "Huh? I'm dead and so are you. And you want to know what? I'm the one with the power here, not you!" She held up the stick she had used to kill him. "You see this? This is what I used to make these demons here. None of these demons were actually demons before I got a hold of them. They were spirits of people who you murdered."

James frowned and looked at the demons. He didn't recognize any of them, but he realized that they did look really really pissed off at him. "Fucking shit," he muttered.

They all rushed him at once, so he rushed them back, mainly because he really didn't have anything else he could do. He quickly discovered that he could hit the demons, which really didn't matter in the long run because once they were all on him, they really got on him. A stream of curses left his mouth as he struggled to get free and then suddenly he was falling, falling so fast that he barely knew what was happening until he hit the ground.

"Aw fuck," he muttered, laying there in a daze until he felt his skin start to burn. "Sweet Jesus!" he shouted, practically jumping back to his feet. He looked around him, seeing the flames and backing away from them slowly. "Oh shit," he muttered. "MARK! GET ME THE FUCK OUT OF HERE!"

…

"How much further is this cemetery?" Shane asked from the backseat. Andy was driving the car and Shannon was sitting up front.

"Not too much farther," Andy replied. "We're almost---whoa!" He stomped on the brakes as they come across a street full of demons. "What the fuck is this?" he said under his breath.

Shane grabbed on to Shannon's arm as the demons all stared at him. He didn't want to be a part of this anymore. He was so sick of this shit that it wasn't funny. All he wanted to do was go back home and go back to a normal existence. No demons, no hell dimensions--none of it.

"I think we should back up now," Shannon said nervously as the demons began to approach them.

Andy nodded in agreement. "Yeah, I think you're right." He started putting the car in reverse but before he could back very far, something hit the front of the car that sent it flying back. Shane let out a scream as they went up in the air, flipping around over and over again. The car eventually landed on its roof, jarring the hell out of his neck. "Ow," he groaned. "Shanny? Are you okay?"

"Yeah," Shannon said weakly. He unbuckled his seat belt and collapsed down on the roof. "Oh fuck…what the fuck is that?"

"I don't know," Andy replied. "But no matter what it was, I'm going to kill it. I fucking mean it. That fucking hurt like a bitch."

…

Matt looked over Jeff and Kylie as they slept. They had both passed out from exhaustion not too long ago. "He looks so peaceful," he said as he leaned back against the wall.

"He does," Chris agreed. He was sitting next to Jeff, running his fingers up and down the younger man's arm. He sighed and kissed the top of Jeff's head. "Do you think this will be over soon?"

"God I hope so," Matt said. "I can't take much more of it." He looked at John, who was staring at the window in disbelief. "What? What's the matter?"

John gulped and pointed to something. "I think it's time we go get Jackie…I think we're about to have a situation."

Matt didn't like the sound of that. He went over to the window and looked out it. "Oh fuck," he muttered. There was an army of demons coming towards the front door and they looked ready to kill. "We are so fucked."


	16. Chapter 16

Jeff woke up to the sound of the window breaking. He sat straight up and screamed when he saw some sort of gremlin looking demon that had wings crawling around on the floor. "Kill it!" he yelled as Kylie woke up and started screaming. "Kill it!"

"We're trying!" Matt shouted. He picked up a chair and began trying to hit the demon with it. The demon was easily dodging the blows though and it started trying to grab John's ankle to bite it. John quickly jumped up on to the bed and before it could climb up after him, Chris pulled a knife out from a dresser drawer and stabbed it right in the back.

"Holy crap," Jeff said in amazement. "How did you know that--"

"The knife was there? They keep knives stashed all over the place here. You never know when you're going to need one here." Chris looked over to the window, which was busted all the hell. "We should probably get out of this room before something else comes busting in here," he said wisely.

Jeff flinched when he heard more crashing coming from downstairs and Jackie screaming at Christina to run. "And go where exactly?" he asked. "I think there's more of them in this place."

"Yeah well, we have to go somewhere," Matt said as he took the chair he was holding and hit another demon that was trying to come through the window right in the face. "We're fucking sitting ducks in here."

Kylie whimpered and clung to Jeff fearfully. "Make them go away," she whispered. "I don't like these things…make them stop coming after us."

Jeff really wished that he could. He would give anything to make this all stop. But since he couldn't, he just got up and held Kylie in his arms tightly.

"Chris!" Jackie yelled. "Matt! Peoples! We need to get the fuck out of here!"

Matt went over to the door and opened it just in time to let Christina and Jackie in. "We need to get the fuck out of here," Jackie informed them. "We're fucking dead if we don't."

"Well thank you Captain Obvious for pointing that out," John said. "But how exactly do you suggest we even get out? We've got demons trying to come in through this window and it sounds like we've got even more coming in through the front door."

"Yeah well that's all the more reason for us to get the fuck out of here," Christina pointed out. She was doing her best to hold Jackie up, who looked irritated as hell about this whole situation.

"She's right," Chris said. "Let's just get out of here."

Jeff nodded his agreement with that plan so Matt shut John up and they started running. Jackie and Christina lead them through the hallways, barely managing to avoid the demons that were chasing after them. Jeff was having a hard time breathing, but that was mainly because Kylie had a death grip on his neck.

"Here we are," Jackie said when they came to an elevator. She got the door opened and they all rushed inside of it.

"Where the hell are we going to go in this thing?" Matt asked as the doors closed.

"Basement," Christina replied. "There's a way to get down into the sewers from there. If we can get down there--"

They never got to discuss what they would do if they got down there. The elevator suddenly stopped, leaving them stranded in between floors. "What the fuck?" John muttered.

"Uh…Jackie?" Chris said nervously.

Jackie smacked the buttons on the elevator, growling when they didn't start moving again. "Damn it," she muttered. "This isn't good."

Jeff agreed whole heartedly with that statement. He rubbed Kylie's back in an effort to get her to stop whimpering, but his hand froze when he heard something thump above them. "Did you guys hear that?" he asked in a hushed voice.

"Hear what?" Matt asked nervously.

There was a long moment of silence and then the thumping noise came again, only it was louder this time. It sounded like someone or something was walking around on top of the elevator. "Holy shit," Matt muttered. He grabbed Jeff and John and forced them to get down. "Uh…I wouldn't mind if we started moving sometime soon."

"Yeah and I wouldn't mind a normal life without this bullshit," Christina muttered as she and Jackie tried to get the thing moving again. We can't always get what we want."

Chris got down but kept staring up at the ceiling. "What the fuck is up there?" he asked to nobody in particular.

They found out just a couple of seconds later. Caedes broke in through the ceiling and knocked Kylie out of the way before snatching Jeff and trying to escape. Jackie managed to grab Jeff's leg and she almost got him back, but then Caedes kicked her in the face, knocking her back just long enough for the elevator to start moving again. "No!" Jeff shouted, looking down and realizing that the thing was going way too fast. "Chris! Matt!" He barely even comprehended the fact that he and Caedes were levitating in mid-air. He just kept watching the others go down further and further before they crashed all the way at the bottom of the elevator shaft.

"I guess something good came out of this night after all," Caedes said happily. "Now hopefully I can get rid of Balthazar…" He realized that he was saying that out loud and quickly shut up and shook his head. "Let's forget about that." He licked Jeff's cheek, making him shudder and want to throw up. "We've got some catching up to do, now don't we?"

Jeff just closed his eyes and began to cry. He tried to fight to get free because he would much rather fall all the way down to surefire injury or potential death, but Caedes refused to let him go. _Shit shit shit! I'm so fucked…_


	17. Chapter 17

"Master?" one of the other demons said in a timid voice. "Shouldn't we be…doing more? I mean…we're just kind of…standing here."

Balthazar rolled his eyes and turned around to face his army. "I know we're standing here," he said. "I'm very aware of what we're doing. That's all we _need_ to do." He pointed to Caedes, who was carrying off his little human bitch like a sack of potatoes. "His resurrection was the trigger that threw the universe out of whack. And since I've made sure nobody in this pathetic dimension can kill him, all we have to do is play until it all unravels completely." He looked at them, only seeing the comprehension on some of their faces. _Good God I am surrounded by morons_. "Just…just go kill some humans, alright?"

They all nodded and went to go did what they told.

"At least they're good at doing what they're told," he muttered under his breath as he turned his attention back to the Applegate Hotel. Since Caedes had managed to get Jeff out without being followed, it was probably safe to assume that the others who were still in the hotel were incapacitated for the time being. That was a good thing, especially when it came to Jackie. He had never met her before but her reputation within the demon community was legendary. Many viewed her as one of the most (if not the most) dangerous demon hunters of the modern age, and while part of him was tempted to go and pick a fight with her on purpose just to test that theory, he knew that plan more often than not led to badness, so that idea needed to be avoided.

_But I do need to try to make sure she's out of the way,_ he thought as he started walking towards the hotel. _If she's even half of what people said she is, then she sure as shit ain't dead yet._ He shook his head, already plotting about how he could change that. He couldn't have her trying to spoil all of his plans. That just wouldn't do at all.

…

"Duck!" Andy yelled loudly.

Shannon cursed and barely got down as a fireball flew over his head and ignited the vampire that had been sneaking up behind him. Even though they had managed to get out of the wrecked car they had been trapped in, their attempts to get anywhere were being hindered by the fact that they kept getting attacked by demons and vampires. They were holding their own so far, but the bad guys showed no signs of slowing down. Add in the fact that the sky was starting to turn red and a couple of portals just kept randomly opening up around them and it was rapidly becoming clear that if something was not done soon, they were utterly and totally fucked.

"How the hell do you people put up with this shit?" Shane asked incredulously. He had picked up a lead pipe and was swinging it around like there was no tomorrow. "Seriously, if this is what you and your friends put up with on a daily basis, then my hat's off to you."

"Thanks," Andy said, looking around to see if anything else was coming at them. "That means a lot."

"Andy! What the hell are you doing out here?"

Shannon turned around at the same time Andy did and saw that Rupes and the others they had been coming to look for coming towards them. His first instinct was to feel relief, but then he saw Mark holding a limp James in his arms and he began to freak out a little bit. "What happened to you guys?" he asked, even though he had a feeling that he didn't want to know.

"His mother's ghost came back and killed him with some mojo stick," Razor answered because Mark and the remaining Lawsons looked like they would lose it if they had to say too much at the moment. "Now we have to resurrect him."

Shannon exchanged a wide eyed look with Shane. If James of all people got offed, then any of them were fair game. James wasn't supposed to die after all. He was the killer, not the killed. To have it be the other way around was going against nature.

"Wonderful," Andy said with a sigh, already turning around and leading them back to the hotel. "I'm sure Jackie is just going to love that."

"Well if she's going to have a problem with it, then fuck her," Mark growled. "I'll fucking do it myself if I have to."

"Uh…but you don't know how to do a resurrection spell," Shane pointed out hesitantly.

If looks could kill, Shane would have been dead before a blink of an eye. "I would figure it out," Mark growled. "It's not like I have anything else to lose at this point."

The way he said that spoke volumes. Shannon looked at the Deadman before looking at Cooper, who was doing his best to keep Connor from going completely apeshit (which was always easier said than done). He sighed heavily before shaking his head. Those three needed James back in the worst way, but he figured that with the world probably coming to an end anyway, there would be no point in doing it right this second. Odds were they would all just die and make it completely pointless.

Of course, he wasn't about to dare say that out loud. He would much rather die at the hands of blood sucking vampires and intestine eating demons than risking the wrath of the Deadman. He had never met psychotic Mark and if he could help it, he was really going to try not to.

…

_Jackie…oh baby girl you have to let me take over…so drained…you could have just let me take over in the first place. It would have saved you a whole lot of trouble._

She groaned and curled up into the fetal position, her stomach churning violently and her head pounding so hard that she thought her brain was going to explode. The others were all just starting to come back around so they weren't noticing what was happening to her. The demon inside of her, which she kept buried deep inside of her, was starting to come out. She was trying to fight it still, mainly because she was scared of what could happen when it came out. She could control the demon to a certain extent, but there were times it acted on its own accord and that almost always led to innocent people getting hurt. And as a sworn protector of those innocent people, that went against everything she fought for and believed in.

"Fuck," Chris cursed. "Is anyone else alive?"

"I am," Matt, Christina and Mor all said at the same time.

"Owie," Kylie whimpered. "I think I broke something."

"Shit," Jackie groaned, letting them know she was somewhat alright. The pain in her head was getting worse by the second and her vision was starting to get blurry. She quickly closed her eyes, feeling her pupils get bigger under her eyelids. All of her veins were starting to harden and rise up, and the control she was trying to keep was rapidly slipping away from her.

"We've got to get the fuck out of here," Matt declared. "That thing's got Jeff--"

"Don't even remind me about that," Chris grunted. "Let's just figure out a way to get out of here and then we'll deal with everything else."

_That'll be easier said than done,_ the demon whispered to Jackie. _Sniff the air Jacqueline. The others aren't going to smell it yet but you'll be able to. Smell that smoky air._

Jackie sniffed and groaned again. Her heightened senses were allowing her to smell the fire. _Oh fuck_, she thought. The hotel was on fire. _Damn it, not again…_

"Jackie can you get up?" Christina asked, leaning over her just a little bit. "We really need your help here."

Jackie tried to respond, but then it felt like her brain exploded and she screamed as her body flew up into the air. The others cried out in shock, but she barely heard them as her clothes melted to her skin and her entire body was instantly covered in a thick, leather like body armor. She let out a snarl and punched out wildly, actually punching a hole in the middle of the ceiling before landing on her feet.

"Holy fucking shit!" John exclaimed, hiding behind Matt. He looked absolutely terrified.

Kylie burst into tears and hugged Chris's leg tightly.

Jackie tilted her head to the side, glaring at all of them. "We have to get out of here," she said, her voice an octave lower than it normally was. "This fucking place is on fire."

"It is?" Christina asked nervously.

Jackie nodded before rubbing her hands together and pressing them against the wall. The transformation had given her enough of an energy boost to make the elevator go back up to ground level and to make the doors open despite being busted. Smoke filled the compartment as soon as it was opened but she quickly grabbed a hold of Kylie and managed to lead them out of the hotel, breaking open a window for them to climb out of when she saw that the front door was blocked by the fire. _Note to self: destroy whoever set this place on fire after I put it out and save the world. If my shit gets damaged I am going to get very fucking upset._

…

**A/N: So Jackie and her group are out of the hotel, the others are heading back there…which just leaves James stuck in hell and Jeff still in Caedes' clutches. Yikes…**


	18. Chapter 18

"Help me!" Jeff screamed as he did everything he could to fight out of Caedes's grip. He had no idea as to where he was being carried off to and he had no idea if the others were alright or not. "Somebody please help me!"

"Nobody's going to help you Jeff," Caedes purred. He had Jeff up on the roof of the tallest building of the city so they had a birds eye view of the city. "Nobody can hear you up here. Besides-" He let Jeff up and forced him to turn around so he could look down at the city below him "-look down there and tell me that there's anyone down there that truly has time to give a shit about you."

Jeff bit his lip and looked down. Everything looked absolutely tiny from up here, but he could see that things were getting absolutely horrible down there. Fires were spreading rapidly, people and demons were running the street, fighting and killing each other off like flies. Then there were the portals that were opening up every which way, sucking people in and spitting out terrifying looking demons. The world was literally falling apart and there didn't seem to be an end to the madness anywhere in sight.

Caedes chuckled and kissed Jeff's neck, making the terrified man want to throw up. "You see? Nobody down there can save you. Your friends…even if they survived that nasty little fall in the elevator, Balthazar will probably do what he can to make sure they don't get out of that hotel alive." His voice noticeably turned nasty when he said Balthazar's name, although why that was Jeff had no clue…at first anyway. Caedes was so pissed that he started babbling a little bit, giving Jeff just a tad bit of insight as to what was going on.

"This was MY apocalypse you know." For a demon, Caedes sounded remarkably like a petulant child at the moment. "I was the one who was going to rule over this pathetic little world. But then dear old Balthazar comes along and turns everything against me…"

"Can't you take it back?" Jeff asked, hoping that maybe if he got on the demon's good side it would somehow help him get out of the predicament he was in now. "I mean, you're all strong and stuff…"

Caedes chuckled bitterly. "Balthazar is trouble that other demons don't even want any part of. Besides, according to him, he's responsible for bringing me back…believe me, the only reason he hasn't killed me yet is because he still needs me." He began running his fingers all over Jeff's face, putting the horribly queasy feeling right back in the youngest Hardy brother's stomach. "Enough about that though. I might not have gotten everything I wanted, but I still have you. And right now, I'm more than willing to settle for that."

Jeff tried to object, but his voice died in his throat when he felt Caedes lick the side of his face. In full panic mode now, he started struggling wildly, managing to twist himself around and kick Caedes between the legs. That only seem to anger the demon though. The next hit he tried to land resulted in his arm being snapped right in half. He screamed in agony, but before he could go into shock, he was being grabbed by the throat and dangled over the edge of the building.

"You shouldn't have done that Jeffey," Caedes growled. He dug his nails into Jeff's neck. Jeff could feel the wounds bleeding already, but there was nothing he could do about it. He just stared at his demon tormenter with wide eyes. He was over ten stories up in the air. If he was let go of now, he was done for. He would fall and die as soon as he hit the pavement. "You don't want to make me your enemy." He smirked cruelly as Jeff whimpered loudly. "You think I hurt you before? Huh? Believe me Jeffey, I can hurt you in ways you haven't even dreamed about yet. I can-"

Something grabbed Caedes from behind and yanked him back violently, which caused him to bring Jeff back over to the safety of the roof. He ended up landing hard on his hands and knees, scraping the hell out of them in the process. That little detail hardly mattered to him in the long run though, because he was too busy staring at what was going on in front of him. Jackie, looking scarier than shit, had Caedes by the ankle and was literally beating him against the roof like there was no tomorrow.

"Bad bad bad!" she chanted every time he made contact with the roof. "Bad bad bad!" Her voice was a lot different than it had before; it sounded positively demonic. _It fits now though_, he thought to himself as he carefully got to himself. His arm hurt so bad that he really wish that he could pas out from the pain. "Is he dead?" he asked when she finally quit banging Caedes around.

"No," she said, swinging Caedes up over her shoulders. "Just unconscious." She motioned for him to follow her. "But he will be soon…hopefully."

That wasn't very comforting. "The others-"

"Are fine. They're finding Rupes and the others while I tracked you down."

"How did you-"

"Would you be creeped out if I told you that I followed your scent?"

"Yes."

"Okay. Then I just won't answer your question then."

…

James panted for breath, his throat absolutely raw and his body begging for mercy. He had lost track of how long he had been stuck in hell. Minutes, hours, days, weeks…years even? Time seemed to work differently down there. If this was where Caroline had been stuck all this time, he didn't blame her for going even crazier than she had been in the first place.

"Come on James, don't wimp out on me now," Caroline said teasingly. She set the branding iron aside and knelt down beside him. "You're a tough guy aren't you? You can take a little torture, can't you?"

He scowled and spit at her defiantly.

She smirked and looked back at Annabelle, who was chained up and being forced to watch what was happening. "Defiant until the end, isn't he?"

Annabelle didn't answer. She was too afraid to speak.

Caroline chuckled before turning her attention back to James. "So pretty when you bleed," she cooed. "So-" A loud growling sound made her stop and look up. "Shoo!" she hissed at the hell hounds that were coming towards her. "Go away!"

The hounds just growled angrily, baring their teeth at her. James looked at Annabelle, who just shook her head. She had no idea as to why they were coming at Caroline either.

"I said shoo!" Caroline snarled, taking a threatening step towards he dog. "Don't make me-"

What happened next took James completely by surprise. The dogs lunged at her, taking her off her feet as they began mauling her. As she screamed and tried to get them off of her, a teenaged boy who looked remarkably like Andy came in and released them from their chains. "Zach Chase, at your service," he said quietly, chuckling at what the hell hounds were doing to Caroline. "And I don't know about you, but I think we need to get the hell out of here."

"Fuck yeah," James grumbled. "That's the best fucking plan I've heard all day."


	19. Chapter 19

"So the world is falling apart all around us, but we're going to stop and do a resurrection spell?" Matt asked as Mark began to tear Rupes' book collection apart, looking for a spell book that was said to be in there. Rupes, Razor and Christina were out there fighting the demons, doing what they could to stop the chaos and destruction. Matt felt like a jackass for not being out there and at least attempting to help, but John had pitched a fit when he had just began to suggest doing such a thing. John was so terrified of losing him that he didn't want any of them to go out and fight. He wanted to leave it to the experts. Matt had tried to explain that if the "experts" didn't get any help then the whole world would be doomed, but it hadn't done much good.

"Fuck the world," Mark muttered. James's death had unhinged him. It was so obvious that it pained Matt to even look at him. He was lost without James. Cooper and Connor were too, but it was chilling to see Mark that way. Even though they all knew he loved James, he so rarely acted like it that they all never really realized just how much the Deadman had cared for his fallen psycho.

"What if the world ends though?" John asked, hiding behind Matt just in case he angered Mark with that question. "If you bring him back and the world ends, then he's just going to die again anyway."

The glare John received from Mark and the two remaining Lawsons was enough to chill anyone's blood. Matt started to speak up on behalf of his lover, but at that moment the door opened, and Jackie came in with Jeff and an unconscious Caedes draped over her shoulder. "Jeff!" he exclaimed, the relief washing over him so strong that he couldn't even begin to describe it properly. He rushed towards his brother, actually knocking Chris out of the way so he could wrap Jeff into his arms and bear hug him. "Oh thank God," he said softly. He planted several kisses on Jeff's cheek. "Thank God."

"Actually, thank Jackie," Jeff said, his voice strained because of how hard Matt was hugging him. "She's the one who saved me."

Matt nodded weakly before kissing Jeff's cheek again and then handing him off to Chris so he could go over to Jackie. "Hey," he said, keeping a safe distance because she was still in full demon mode. "Look, I just-"

"You don't need to thank me," she said, getting a set of chains out from underneath the receptionist's desk so she could chain up Caedes to the chair that was next to her. "It's what I do."

"I know but still…" Matt's voice trailed off as he watched the chains go around Caedes's body. "Will those hold him?"

"Yeah," Jackie confirmed. "They're magically reinforced. Believe me, he's not getting out of these things unless I want him too." She locked the chains and then smacked the bastard across the face. "Come on, rise and shine," she said gruffly. "I can' interrogate you when you're sleeping."

"Mark!" Cooper said, holding up a book that had to be at least five hundred pages long. "I've found it."

Moving faster than Matt had seen him move in years, Mark snatched the book out of Cooper's hands and looked at the page Cooper had marked. "Jackie," he said, walking over to her and practically shoving the book in her face. "Do it."

Matt tensed up when an irritated look flashed across her face. "In a minute," she said, glaring at Caedes as he opened his eyes. "I've got a demon to interrogate."

Mark scowled. He was so used to calling the shots with people and given the fact that James was gone, it made his fuse that much shorter. "NOW god damn it!" he snarled, grabbing her by the hair and yanking her back.

Matt tried to step in and play peacemaker, but Jackie struck before he could move a muscle. She kicked Mark in the chest, sending him flying all the way across the room. He bounced off the wall and landed in a heap on the floor.

"Whoa," Cooper said, looking at Jackie with wide eyes. It almost looked like he wanted to marry her right then and there.

"I know you miss him," she said, talking to Mark as he slowly got up to his feet. "But we're out of time. I don't get the answers now-"

"You'll never get anything from me," Caedes said defiantly. He glared at them all angrily, making Jeff shrink back behind Chris. "It's too late. The-"

"Shut up," Jackie growled, popping him right in the mouth. "The only words I want to hear out of your mouth are you telling me how to stop it all. You understand me?"

Caedes spat right in her face. "Fuck you, you stupid bitch."

Instead of getting pissed about the spit, Jackie just grinned and wiped it away. "Oh I was hoping you would do something like that," she said darkly.

Matt took a step back. He had a bad feeling that he wasn't going to like this at all.

…

"So let me get this straight," James said as he and Annabelle followed Zach through the depths of hell. He kept expecting Caroline or something just as bad as she was to come swooping down on them and attacking them at any second, but so far they had managed to keep luck on their side. "You fought demons, vampires and a shit ton of other freaky stuff, yet you were killed by a guy with a gun?"

"Hey, in my defense, it was a deranged guy who was part of an anarchist group hell bent on breaking down the government and ruling over the chaos," Zach said, not even looking back as he answered the question. "Believe me, these crazy terrorist groups are just as evil as any creature that goes bump in the night."

"So how did you end up in hell?" Annabelle asked, grabbing on to James's hand and holding it tightly.

"Portal," Zach replied. "It wasn't by choice; one minute I'm in paradise and the next minute I was here. I've been looking for a way to stop whatever is going on in the land of the living so I can go the fuck back home."

"Do you know the whole story?" James asked, hoping to God he wouldn't have to explain anything to him. He wasn't sure if he could get his head around it all and not leave out something important.

"I know enough to know that there's a heart that's being guarded about a half mile ahead," Zach replied. "Now I don't know mechanics of everything, but if we destroy the heart, the world stops ending and we're in the good."

"Are you serious?" James asked. That sounded so fucking simple. He should have known right then that there was a catch.

"Yeah," Zach said cheerfully. "All we have to do is get around the demon guards and cross the sea of blood and we should have it in the bag."

James's eyes widened and he looked at Annabelle, who was shaking her head. "Remember the good old days where the craziest thing I had to deal with was you being you? Yeah, I miss those days. So so fucking badly"

…

Jeff put his hands over his ears, doing what he could to block out the terrible screams that were coming from Caedes's mouth. All Jackie was doing was touching his forehead…at least that's all Jeff could SEE anyway. There was obviously something more going on though, because Caedes was screaming like he was getting horribly tortured.

"Jesus Christ," Shane muttered, actually wincing now. Shannon had taken Kylie upstairs just a little bit ago so she didn't have to witness whatever it was that was happening before them. "I know he deserves this but this is getting ridiculous."

"He brought it on himself," Jackie said, finally stopping so Caedes could breathe. "He didn't want to talk, so I had to loosen his tongue." She smirked and patted Caedes on the head. "You want to talk now though, don't you?"

"Y-Yes," Caedes stuttered, gasping for breath. "Yes I do."

"Good." Jackie leaned forward and put her face right in front of Caedes. "Tell me something I don't know."

Caedes took several labored breaths before speaking. "My heart…it's in hell. Destroy that…you destroy me and stop the madness…" He chuckled. "But you're almost out of time. You won't be able-"

"Hell? Ha!" Jackie smirked triumphantly. "Oh honey, I already-" She looked back out at the others and then frowned. "Uh…where did Mr. Grouchy Pants and the kiddies go?"

Jeff blinked and looked around, noticing for the first time that Mark, Cooper, Connor and James's body had disappeared. "Uh…crap. I have no idea."

"Jesus Christ," Jackie muttered. She was already on the war path to hunt them down. "I swear, if they resurrect him before I can even try my plan I'll kill them myself and make them do it."

Jeff looked at Chris. "She's kidding, right?"

Chris shook his head. "Nope. She's serious." He grabbed Jeff by the hand and started pulling him along. It went without saying that they needed to help with the hunt so they could try to prevent Jackie from doing something she would possibly regret later.


	20. Chapter 20

"Are you sure you know what you're doing?" Cooper asked as he watched Mark light the candles and place them around James's body. They were upstairs in one of the empty bedrooms, just waiting for either Mark to get the job done or for them to get interrupted. "Because if you fuck this up-"

"I'm not going to fuck it up," Mark growled. He knelt down in front of James and grabbed the book, which had been set down on the bed. "Just sit your asses down and let me do the work."

Cooper sighed and knelt down at James's side, motioning for Connor to do the same. There was a part of him that was thinking that he needed to put the brakes on this thing. It felt like Mark was rushing this quite a bit and if he pushed his luck something was going to go wrong. "Mark-"

"Don't say it," Mark growled, taking James's knife and holding on to it tightly. "I wouldn't fucking do this if I wasn't sure this will work."

Cooper couldn't tell whether Mark was being honest or if he was do desperate to get James back that he was believing his own bluff. "But-"

"No buts. We're doing this now," Mark stretched out his arm and placed the blade of the knife up against his wrist. "And once we start, we can't stop. You hear me?"

"Yeah," Connor said before Cooper could open his mouth again. "We hear you. Right Coopy?"

Cooper sighed and nodded. Satisfied, Mark cut himself all the way up from his wrist up to his elbow, forcing open James's mouth so the blood could drip down into it. Cooper made a face but he didn't say anything. He just listened as Mark began to chant in Latin, not having a clue about what was being said besides from the word "Osiris".

There was some banging on the door and for a moment, the barricade that had been set up almost got pushed through. But then there was a loud crash downstairs and the faint sound of Christina screaming. _That should distract Jackie for a moment,_ Cooper thought as he looked at Connor.

"It's cold in here now Coopy," Connor complained, grabbing on to his head like he had a really bad headache.

"Oh shit," Cooper muttered, reaching over James's body so he could grab a hold of Connor's arms. If Connor was about to have another one of those vision things then he had no idea what he was going to do. "Connor come on, fight it. Fight it for…" His voice trailed off as he saw deep, ugly cuts going up Mark's arms all by themselves. "What the fuck?" he muttered under his breath. Something had to be in the room with them. It was the only logical explanation that Cooper could come up with. _Shit just keeps getting fucking crazier and crazier._

…

"All aboard!" Zach said happily as James and Annabelle followed him into the small wooden boat that would take them across the sea of blood. Dispatching the demon guards had been easier than they thought it was going to be, so all they had to do now was row the damn boat to the small little island up ahead of them and destroy that damn heart. It sounded easy enough on paper-which should have tipped them all off that it was going to go horribly wrong.

"Are you okay?" Annabelle asked James as they rowed the boat. "You look…funny."

James just shrugged off the question, although to be honest, he felt pretty funny. He wasn't sure how to describe it exactly; it almost seemed like he was starting to fade away, which was kind of scary. Why the hell was it happening? Where would he go if it actually happened?

"Whose blood do you think this is?" he asked, deciding just to take the topic of conversation in another direction.

Zach shook his head. "I'm not sure. The blood of the innocent sounds like a good answer but it's also kind of cliché." He stopped and frowned when they all saw the blood rippling in a weird fashion. "What the he-"

The boat suddenly turned over, sending all three of them straight into the blood. As soon as they hit the warm red liquid, dozens upon dozens of hands grabbed them and started pulling them deeper and deeper down. James immediately began trying to fight them off, freaking right the hell out. He wasn't sure if he could drown given the fact that he was already dead, but not only was he sure that he didn't want to find out, he was quite certain that he did not want to go where these things were taking him.

Using every ounce of strength he had in him, he managed to get himself free and back up to the surface. "Fuck me," he groaned loudly. The blood was in his ears and eyes, which made it pretty much impossible to hear or see anything. Only taking a split second to make a half hearted attempt of wiping his eyes clean, he began to swim forward, grabbing on to Annabelle so to try to keep her from getting pulled back under.

"Where's Zach?" she asked, hanging on to him for dear life.

"Don't know," James replied. "I-" Hands grabbed his ankles and pull him and Annabelle back under, causing a whole bunch of blood to fill his lungs. He cursed inwardly, panicking as the feeling of drowning began to take him over…

…

Connor screamed in pain, almost wishing that his brain would just go ahead and explode already so he wouldn't have to feel this pain anymore. He could see both of his parents drowning in a sea of blood and there was absolutely nothing he could do about it. That helplessness was actually just as bad as the pain in his head. He didn't want to see his parents die again. He had already seen that and he couldn't stand the thought of it happening again.

"Connor!" Cooper hissed, tightening his grip on him so he wouldn't collapse on top of James. Mark was still chanting away, although he was gasping for breath for some reason. "Connor talk to me. What's wrong?"

Connor couldn't speak. His head hurt too much and it felt like he was going to throw up. He took several deep breaths, hoping that it would make him feel better. It didn't though. In fact, he was starting to feel worse. The vision of James and Annabelle was starting to slip away from him but new ones were replacing it. Flashes of people dying, demons coming from out of thin air and up from the earth….the list went on and on.

"Fucking shit," Cooper muttered. "Fuck fuck fuck-"

Mark began choking and coughing loudly, doubling over and digging his fingers into the carpet as much as he could. Connor and Cooper both watched him with wide eyes, too shocked to even move. For a moment, they were positive that Mark was going to blow chunks all over the place. But just when they were going to get up and run for cover, a snake began to slither out of Mark's mouth, sliding harmlessly down to the floor and moving away from them.

"Uh…what the fuck was that?" Cooper asked in shock.

Connor couldn't answer that. He was too busy trying not to pass out. He was afraid that if he passed out, the spell wouldn't work and James wouldn't come back. The mere thought of that terrified him to his core. He needed James to come back. That was about the only thing he knew for sure at that point. The thought of this not working…well it was just a thought he could not tolerate.

…

Balthazar watched as the Applegate Hotel once again erupted into pure and total. It was an absolutely splendid sight. The demons had gotten passed the traitor demon and the few pathetic humans guarding the front of it and were now wrecking havoc on everyone in the building. He could see them all fighting, holding on to the faint hope that they could somehow win this fight. Pathetic little creatures. They didn't understand that it was too late. The world as they knew it was unraveling and there was nothing anyone could do to stop it.

…

Jackie was finding herself growing more and more exasperated by the second. Her plan to stop Mark from bringing James back had gone all to shit when a demon had literally tackled Christina through the hotel's front doors. Her first instinct had always been to come to her siblings' aid. When she had heard Christina scream, the world was forgotten and she went to help her. The only problem was though was that now that she had helped her, the lobby had become an abyss of demons. They were everywhere-coming in through the front, the back, the side windows, from random portals-the list went on and on.

"Fuck!" Andy shouted, nearly getting his whole gut sliced open by demon's claws. He was fighting alongside her, as was Rupes, Razor, Shannon, Matt, Shane Chris and Christina. John had grabbed Jeff and Kylie and had taken them somewhere upstairs, where it was hopefully safe for the time being.

"We really need to end this!" Razor said, stating the obvious.

"Yeah well do you think that's even possible at this point?" Shannon asked. He was fighting as hard as he could, but it was obvious to Jackie that he wasn't going to last much longer.

Snatching a hellhound out of mid-air and snapping it's neck, Jackie caught a glimpse of a demon watching them out of the broken front door. She couldn't tell what the hell it really was, but she could tell that it was amused by their fight to survive. This pissed her off royally. It was one thing for her to go down swinging but it was another for some rat faced bastard to get joy out of it. _If I can't save the world I'm at least making sure that worm gets it. _

…

"LET GO!" James heard Zach shout at the top of his lungs. He and Annabelle had barely managed to make it up to the shore, although the weird zombie blood creatures were doing their best to pull them back in. "SON OF A BITCH!"

"Looks like he made it out alright," Annabelle observed, shrieking loudly when a hand grabbed her by the hair and started pulling back.

James punched the thing's arm until it let go, getting up to his own and grabbing Annabelle so he could pull her along. He could feel himself getting weaker and weaker by the second. He was literally having to fight to stay here and help. He was starting to lose though. It was taking too much out of him to hold on any longer.

"James just let me go!" Annabelle ordered when twelve hands reached out and grabbed a hold of her legs. "Get the heart!"

"I'm not leaving you," he said stubbornly, barely avoiding falling on his face as they were pulled back to the blood.

"You don't get the heart then we're both fucked," she insisted, actually glaring up at him. "The only chance you have of saving me is to just let me go."

James held on to her more tightly, knowing she was right but not wanting to let her go. "James please," she begged. "End it now. Before Cooper and Connor die too."

That statement was like a sledgehammer to James's face. He let out an uneasy breath and gave Annabelle one last kiss before setting her down, scooping up a jagged rock in his arms as he ran towards the heart. It was up on a podium, just laying there and waiting for him as the zombie things came out of the blood and started running at him. _Please let this work,_ he prayed as he brought the pointy end of the rock down. _Please please please…_

…

A blinding white light filled the whole room and the a huge gust of wind blew Mark backwards, putting him on the floor and keeping him there. He tried to yell but he couldn't even begin to talk. An impossibly loud ringing noise filled his ears, making him positive that he was going to go deaf. He wasn't sure how long it actually lasted, but it seemed to go on forever. When the light finally faded though and he was able to see and hear again, what he saw was James sitting straight up and what he heard was him gasping for air. "Lawson?" he groaned, reaching out for his lover.

James kept panting for breath as he reached out and grabbed Mark's hand. He was really here. He was really back. "Marky-"

The effects of the spell began to hit Mark all at once suddenly and as hard as he tried, he couldn't stay awake. He ended up fainting before James ever finished his sentence.


	21. Chapter 21

"Don't you ever-and I mean EVER-die on me like that again! Do you hear me?"

"Don't make it just about you jackass! Connor and I lost him too-"

"You can scold him later! Right now it's my turn. I brought him back, I get that right."

James blinked and looked back and forth between Cooper and Mark before setting his eyes on Jeff. "Help?" he squeaked out in a small voice.

Jeff just shook his head. He wasn't getting involved in that argument. It wasn't even really that serious of a thing. Mark and Cooper were obviously just so relieved that James was alive again that they couldn't properly express it (at least not right there in front of everyone) and they were resorting to snapping at each other, just like they always did.

"Daddy? What was hell like?" Connor asked softly. He had his arms wrapped around James and he didn't seem to be ready to let go any time soon.

James winced at the question. "It sucked," he answered. "It really really sucked."

"It sucked? That's all you have to say?" Shannon said in disbelief. "Understatement much?"

"Ease off him Shanny," Jeff said. He pulled Kylie into his lap and hugged her tightly. "He's been through enough shit."

"Truer words have never been spoken," James muttered, which made Connor hug him tighter and Cooper and Mark stop their bickering.

Jeff shook his head, feeling like he had slipped into a kind of shock. He wasn't even sure if it was really all over yet. Sure, destroying Caedes's heart had not only killed the bastard but had put a stop to the end of the world, but it just felt too good to be true. Maybe it was just him; maybe he actually didn't want to believe that it was all over because it meant that he now had to deal with the emotional aftermath of it all. Watching his dad get killed, getting raped by a demon…none of that felt real. It felt like a horrible horrible dream. _It wasn't though. It happened. It really really happened._

"I am never going to stop washing my hands," Shane declared as he came back inside. He, Jackie, Andy, Christina, Matt, Rupes, Razor and Chris had been getting rid of all the demon bodies and they had just gotten done. "Do you guys have any bleach or something?"

"You can't bleach on your hands," John said as he flipped his hair back. "Do you have any idea what that would do to your skin?"

Mark frowned, his lips twitching uncontrollably. "His skin? That's what you're worried about?"

"Well someone here has to worry about it," John said defensively. "Shannon's not smart enough to do it for him like a good boyfriend."

"Oh fuck off you big fairy," Shannon snapped.

"Hey!" Matt said. "He's my big fairy so lay off!"

Shannon stuck his tongue out at Matt while John hugged the dark haired Hardy. "You tell him Matt," he said as he kissed him on the cheek.

"You know, I think we should take the time to observe the irony of a murder saving the lives of billions of people," Chris said as he walked over to Jeff and sat down next to him. "Because I'm still actually trying to wrap my head around it."

James smirked. "Well while your wrapping your mind around it, I think we should have some sort of celebration in my honor."

Cooper rolled his eyes. "You just want us to sit around and stroke your ego," he said affectionately.

Kylie frowned and looked up at Jeff. "What does that mean?" she asked innocently.

"It means that he wants us to make him feel good about himself," Jeff explained.

"Oh."

"Well seeing as that the world's saved, I say we party," Jackie said with a grin. She was slowly but surely returning back to her normal human state, which was a relief to Jeff. Her demon side really creeped him out.

Mark gave her a dubious look. "And why would I want to party with you? You kicked me across the room!"

James's eyes widened as he looked at Jackie. "You did what to my Marky?"

"Hey, he got all grabby and snarly with me," Jackie said in her own defense. "So he started it."

"My Marky wouldn't do that," James said with a frown.

"Hey now, let's not waste time arguing," Rupes interrupted. "If I've learned anything in all my years of fighting demons, it's that there's only three things that can help someone unwind and gain perspective on all this bullshit: beer, pizza and more beer."

"Amen," Razor muttered. "A-fucking-men."

…

Caroline stepped over the bodies of the hell hounds she had just killed, all the claw and bite marks on her body stinging like hell. She was in as foul of mood as she could possibly be in. Not only had she been attacked, but Balthazar's plan had failed. James had gotten to Caedes's heart and had destroyed it, saving the world in the process. It made her sick to even think about it. That fucking little bastard…oh how she hated him. And the worse part was, he was gone, so she couldn't torture him. And Annabelle was gone too, so she had nobody really worth hurting. "Mother fucker," she snarled. She picked up the mojo stick that Balthazar gave her and stormed off to find the demon in question. He had promised her success. He had lied. Bastard had to pay.

It wasn't too hard to find him. When the heart had been destroyed, the dimensions had stopped bleeding together and all the demons and spirits that had either escaped or had been taken unwillingly from their home dimension had been returned to their rightful place. That meant Balthazar was stuck in hell once again and he was not happy about it. He was cursing in some language that she didn't understand and he was throwing shit around, acting like a big baby.

_I should have known better to ever believe he was competent_, she thought angrily. _Men. They're all the same, no matter whether they're human or not._ She tightened her grip on her stick before raising it up and using it against the unsuspecting demon. If she wasn't going to be able to torture James and Annabelle for all eternity, then this son of a bitch was just going to have to do.

…

Mark polished off his third beer as he watched James single handily devour one of the twelve pizzas they had ordered. There was so much that he wanted to say but he couldn't even begin to find the words. So he just sat back and watched his lover while doing his best to repress the fact that he had ever lost him in the first place. That was just a subject that he never ever wanted to approach again if he could absolutely help it.

"So what happens now?" Shannon asked. The party really wasn't much of a party because Jeff and Matt had gone off on their own and John and Chris had gone to comfort them. Mark was sure that the loss of their father was really starting to sink in for them and he felt sorry for them. He really did. But it didn't feel like his place to go comfort them. John and Chris could take care of them. He was sure of that.

"What do you mean?" Jackie asked as she bobbed her head along to the Stone Temple Pilots song playing on the radio.

"What do you mean what do I mean? I mean what happens now? I mean the world just about ended! Shouldn't there be a press conference or-"

Jackie burst out laughing at that. "A press conference?" She shook her head and continued to laugh.

"Nobody besides us and the rest of this town is ever going to know that the world almost ended," Rupes explained. "And for us here in the good old AC, life is just going to go on."

"Well that's fucking bullshit," Shane declared. "After all that-"

"It's just the way it has to be," Andy explained. "The world at large can't know about all of this. They can't handle it."

"Yeah really," Razor agreed. "Humans overall are too paranoid. If everyone knew about vampires and demons, chaos would erupt. Everyone would be accusing each other of being an evil fiend and it would just get ugly."

"So what do we do then?" Cooper asked as he gestured to everyone in the room who wasn't an Apocalypse City native.

Jackie got a serious look on her face. "Honestly? I say just get the hell out of here and don't look back. You get too deep in this shit and it consumes your fucking life. Believe me, I know from experience."

Rupes winced at the bitterness in her voice before pointing to Kylie. "It's why we want you guys to take her with you when you go. She doesn't deserve to live the life we all have. Full of violence and death and chaos…she deserves a normal life."

Mark looked back at the little girl, who was playing with Christina. His first instinct was to have her go with Chris and Jeff. She seemed to have bonded with them the most and they seemed to be just as attached back. Of course the only question was, could Chris and Jeff handle raising a little girl right now? He wasn't so sure…

"Marky?"

Mark turned back around and looked at James. "What?"

"I'm horny."

Cooper and Connor groaned while Andy and Jackie perked right up. It was almost like they were eager to see a show or something. Mark wasn't going to give them one though. He simply just got to his feet and pulled James up so they could go somewhere more private.

"Oooh, a little anxious aren't we Marky?" James said with a big grin.

Mark just grunted in response.

"Well just so you know, I'm on top tonight."

"Fine."

"Fine? That's it? You're not going to put up a fight?" James sounded completely and totally amazed. "Wow, I should die more often."

Mark spun around so fast he just about knocked James on his ass. "Don't you DARE even JOKE about that? Do you understand me?"

James quickly nodded. "Alright _alright_. Jesus Christ, get your panties out of the bunch."

Mark shook his head and let out a shaky sigh. "Alright. Just so that's clear."

"Oh we're clear alright."

"Good."

…

Chris hated the sound of Jeff crying. He really really did. What he hated even more though was the fact that there wasn't any way he could really comfort his boyfriend. All he could do was help Matt hold him and listen helplessly. Everything that had happened lately had finally really sunk in and now all Jeff could do was cry. Matt was crying too, but Jeff was literally sobbing so hard that Chris seriously thought he was going to stop being able to breathe at any second.

Matt seemed to be thinking the same thing because he started trying to actively trying to get Jeff to calm down just a little bit. "Ssshh, it's going to be alright," he promised in a hoarse whisper. "It's going to be okay. Just breathe baby. Just breathe."

Jeff refused to listen. He just continued to sob and hide his face in Matt's chest.

Chris looked at John, who just shook his head helplessly. They was really nothing either of them could say that could make anything better. Gil was dead and Jeff was probably going to be forever traumatized by everything that had happened. The universe had been set back in order and they could all live to see another day, but their lives had forever been altered. There was really no going back to the way things were, no matter how much any of them wanted to.

"Jeffrey? Jeffrey come on, don't cry like that. You're going to pass if you keep doing that."

John screamed in fright and Matt, Jeff and Chris all looked up like they had just heard a gunshot. Gil, Annabelle and Zach were standing in front of them, looking like they were just barely hanging on to staying right in front of them. "Holy shit," Chris muttered.

"Yeah, that's what I said," Zach said with a grin. "I don't think I like being a ghost. It's too weird."

Annabelle pointed towards the hotel. "Are James and in the boys in there?"

"Yeah," Chris answered. He moved out of the way so she and Zach could go in there and see everyone.

"They could have gone through you you know," John said in a hushed voice.

Chris shook his head. He hadn't wanted that. That had happened once and it had been way WAY too weird.

"Dad?" Matt said hesitantly, speaking up because Jeff looked like he was in way too much shock to do so. "What are you doing here?"

"I had to tell you boys something," Gil replied. He placed his ghostly hands on Matt and Jeff's shoulders, making them both shiver noticeably. "And I need you to listen to me very carefully, because it's important. Can you do that?"

Matt and Jeff both nodded.

"Okay. It's going to be alright. Everything is going to be alright, you hear me? Life isn't going to stop because I'm gone and you're both strong enough to get along without me. You understand?"

"But-" Jeff started to object.

"No buts," Gil said firmly. "You're going to be alright, you understand me?"

"Yes," Matt said as Jeff just nodded. "We understand."

"Good." Gil placed one last kiss on his sons' heads before disappearing, leaving all of them to stand there and watch as the sun began to peek out from the horizon.


End file.
